After those US$560,000 Michael Jordan Nikes, the next three most expensive pairs of sneakers ever sold

The wealthiest sneakerheads amass collections that rival in cost those of Hermès Birkin bag collectors

It won’t come as a huge surprise to some that the four priciest pairs of sneakers ever auctioned were all products of the same brand

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Nike top the list of the most expensive sneakers to have ever been sold at auction – and two of them were worn by basketball legend Michael Jordan. Photo: AFP

Published: 7:15pm, 30 May 2020Updated: 3:08pm, 1 Jul 2020

Sneakers can be extremely valuable, and no one knows that better than sneakerheads. The wardrobes of some of the most prominent sneaker collectors can be as mindbogglingly expensive as those of Hermès Birkin bag collectors.

Today, many collectors can find shoes on the resale market, which had an estimated worth of US$2 billion in 2019, according to Business Insider's Dennis Green.

The value of a given pair of sneakers is often tied to the history behind them.

Shoes worn by Michael Jordan, for example, tell the story of the US basketball player’s career and serve as snapshots in time. Other shoes are valuable because of how rare they are; one example is the Nike Dunk SB Low Paris, of which less than 200 pairs exist.

Recently, a pair of Michael Jordan’s game-worn shoes sold for more than a half a million US dollars, making them the most expensive sneakers ever auctioned.

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