The Ugly Sneaker Trend Has Come for Sandals, and I’m All the Way In
Maybe you’ve heard that the Biggest Trend in Sneakers Is Ugly. This is fantastic news if you’re somebody who can afford thousands of dollars’ worth of disposable trend footwear, or an Instagram influencer who gets free stuff anyway, or my nemesis Jared Leto. But it’s wonderful especially if you are me and last year you ordered the most horrible pair of sandals on Amazon because you needed something for comfortable city walking that ventilated your feet without exposing how ugly and mangled they are, and Keen’s Uneek sandals arrived at your door and, surprise, they are now on-trend.
The Uneek sandals are the perfect summer 2018 footwear choice. The Portland-based active-footwear brand launched Uneek as a city-friendly extension of their hiking range, which is even wilder to look at. Its main design objective was the concept of “being barefoot while wearing a shoe,” according to the guy who invented them. The result is a shoe that miraculously assumes a custom fit every time you slip your foot into it. The Uneeks have won at least one German innovation award, and they are huge in Japan, where you can buy them at United Arrows.
They are also almost offensive to look at. And yet I love them, so much.
I love that most of the shoe is made of polyester paracord with a nylon core, which makes them durable but malleable, perfect if you're hiking, which you are not. I love that this cord-based structure allows air to pass through freely but still obscures my disgusting toes from onlooking haters.
I love the metatomical footbed design, "anatomically engineered to provide excellent arch support and cradle the natural contours of the foot," as if you are stepping into God's warm palms.
I love that they cost $100, the perfect amount of money to spend on footwear, in my opinion.
I also love that they are odor-controlled.
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The Uneek answers the question of "What if there was a Teva that, like, covered more of your foot, in case you were hiking the Pacific Coast Trail, and what if it was also made of materials that could withstand a nuclear holocaust?" Like all ugly shoes, Uneeks have an identity crisis—part hiking sandal, part beach sandal. And yet Uneeks are neither athletic nor leisure nor athleisure. They are purely comfortable and happy as they are, balking at even the idea of aesthetic refinement. Uneeks are not interested in your ugly-shoe trend, and yet they love you so much, and are willing to contort themselves to the shapes of your feet, because they want to eliminate pressure points and cushion your every step.
Truly, there is no better sandal for a moderately active lifestyle. They are the platonic ideal of a summer shoe, which is comfortable enough to be worn for hours but appropriate for non-beach situations. Like errands. Drinks with some buds. Antiquing. Walking introspectively beside a river. Writing a heartfelt sandal rhapsody at a local coffee shop.
They lend themselves to any outfit. If you are brave enough to wear a paracord sandal, you are brave enough to pull it off with anything you have in your wardrobe. I find they look best with a simple jean, a T-shirt, and a spirit of adventure.
But there’s also something deeper going on here. Ugly shoes are not simply bad-looking and foot-loving. Ugly shoes are ambitious, and that's what makes them unseemly. Why just be a sneaker when you can also be a hiking boot, like this pair by Fear of God? (Fear of God, indeed.) Why settle for a career in sneakerhood when you have dreams of being a podiatric insole also? Balenciaga's Triple S are wildly popular because they're asking for more of their customer. They're leaning in. This is what makes them powerful, off-putting, and impossibly magnetic. Doubly so if they’re sandals.
