This summer, the footwear styles are going to be eclectic, and in a good way. While flip-flips and sneaks will be prevalent, young people are going for it when it comes to fashionable feet in the heat in terms of colors, styles, and mash-ups. Top trends from last weekend’s Coachella Music Arts Festival is often a good indicator of what’s to come this summer for festival season in general. The new style to note are the gladiator sandals that either wrap up the ankle and lower leg, or have leather straps and buckles around the calf. We saw this over and over again, in black leather, gold, white, and red.
Other hot items are massively big, all-over faux fur boots, which are especially cool when paired with a sundress. (High spats attached under the knee with sandals are another take on this look.) We first noticed this from taking street snaps in Harajuku, Tokyo, while covering Cyber Goth divas last fall, and the following from Tokyo Dark Castle events (which has spread into San Francisco). While real Goth’s from Japan have expanded their all-over fur boot repertoire into neon-colored fur in pink and purple, the tamer version and recontextualized version is the festival, outdoorsy indie music lover girl who wears them in brown -with a nod to animals, forests, and the entire deer and antlers trend that continues to reign in our environmental generation.
Low cowboy boots, which were the rage last summer, are still prevalent but now in different colors, including white and especially cool when paired with pulled up tube socks with different colors.
Neon socks or neon shoes or simply neon sneaker laces also make summer footwear fashion fun, and as we’ve seen from the latest new drops in sneaker culture, neon-colors in sneakers are clearly going to be a favorite.
Finally, the pirate motif in footwear is going strong, especially slouched or turned over suede boots in black, brown or steel grey. Similar to what was worn in 1984, then modernized by Kate Moss later (which all originated with Vivienne Westwood), this is among a leading trend for women -especially when paired with dresses, skirts, and short denim cut-offs.
”