What’s It Like Wearing the Biggest Shoes in Fashion?

I’m wearing the most comfortable sneakers right now. It’s like a walking foot massage, cradled by delicious padded foam and kissed by a puffer coat. I feel like I’m getting a deluxe foot rub. And while these kicks are extremely comfortable, they are also the largest sneakers. Humongous. Hulking. It looks like my foot got stuck in a beehive. They are the classic Adidas Superstars, but now laughably extended and bloated, courtesy of Kerwin Frost, the personality known for his bizarre street style and his talk show, Kerwin Frost Talks. Frost, who collaborated with Adidas on the design, christened the shoe the Superstuffed thanks to its XXL look. Each one is fitted to someone’s actual size but appears five sizes larger due to its funhouse mirror “stuffed” qualities.

Frost has always been one for playing with proportions. He attends Fashion Week in comically bulky suits and Gumby-stretched top hats. He also loves his weirdo footwear and traipses around from show to show in custom clown shoes the size of a baby. His love for extreme proportions was one of the inspirations for his newest shoe. “I love mascot shoes,” he says. “When I was growing up, I would wear my cousin’s sneakers, and they would be bigger than mine. I always thought the proportion was hilarious.” Frost also culled references from Adidas, including a sculpture of a pair of giant Superstars outside the Adidas office in Portland, Oregon. Frost took notes of Run-DMC as well, the rap group that popularized the Superstars and eventually gained a sneaker endorsement. “I was like, This is such a clean way to serve all those things,” adds Frost.

For the campaign, Frost promoted the shoe as if he were a superhero in a blue muscle suit, stomping around the city like Godzilla, with the jumbo-fied shoe on his back. IRL, he wore it with a slew of tracksuits on Instagram. Over the past week, these very shoes have been popping up on feeds styled in various ways. Ella Emhoff wore hers with gym shorts and a ribbed tank, and photographed herself with her foot propped up to the mirror. Bella Hadid wore them with skinny jeans.

I decided to give the shoes a try with my own rendition. I had no idea what to wear. Frost’s wife, Erin Yogasundram, who helped design the shoe, recommended I try something like a Comme des Garçons skirt or skinny jeans. “They are universal,” she says. At first I tried a pair of Wrangler mom jeans, but the shoes felt a bit hidden. In the end I opted for a plain white ribbed tank and Tom Ford–era Gucci electric blue snakeskin-print pants.

I’m typically a standard size 8, but in these I’m a whopping size 13. They aren’t necessarily out-of-control wacky, because they’re based on a familiar, pared-back sneaker. There are no bright colors; there’s no peacocking. It takes a second glance to realize that something is tweaked in the silhouette. But their quiet funk is the beauty of the style. They’re subtly outré, not hit-you-over-the-head traffic-stopping.

And once a person takes note? It’s typically “Wow; those are some big shoes!” They are a goofy piece of footwear. I sent a photo to my friend, who wrote, “Hi, Ronald McDonald.” While another texted, “It looks like your foot is swollen.”

To see how the shoes fared in person, I took them for a stroll. I walked to the subway, and with every step, it felt like I was walking on a cloud. When I got to my office, my colleague Emily Farra had to do a deep gaze to see something askew with my outfit. “They look like pillows on your feet—you could drop a dumbbell on them and you wouldn’t feel it!” she said. But Farra also noted that they do change the shape of an outfit: “At first they look like regular Superstars, especially from the front, but from the side they cut a totally different silhouette with your pants.” She reasoned that they aren’t a huge pivot from the other clunky footwear everyone seems to be wearing these days. “People just really love a big shoe!” Outfit aside, I spent the whole day plodding around the office because, truly, it feels like foot-coddling therapy. Those little piggies are taken care of in a plush puff.

While I had fun in the shoes, Frost notes that these big sneakers can do big things for those with tiny feet. He mentions a follower who participated in a giveaway contest: “He is a superbig guy, but he has really small feet. He’s a size 6.5. I went on his page, and he is a sneakerhead, so this is someone who will get the Superstuffed.” Frost compares the shoe to a bra—something that will give your foot a bit of oomph. “So if you think about it, it’s therapeutic for people who have been ostracized for their small feet,” he adds. “You can forget that it’s not just fashion, it’s function.” That’s one huge step for mankind indeed.

KF Superstar Superstuffed Shoes, $250; adidas.com

Originally Appeared on Vogue