Fashion has been having a bit of a foot obsession for the last couple of years. Recently, we’ve seen Marc Jacobs send puffed-up pumps fit for Barbie down the runway, New York Fashion Week become fixated with FiveFinger Vibram shoes, and that’s before you count Schiaparelli’s golden toe sneakers and literally any footwear that Jonathan Anderson makes. It’s not so much a race to the bottom but a journey to the jaunty, with the oddest shoe designs racking up those coveted social media impressions. And now Miu Miu is entering the chat.
Ths week, the Italian fashion house launched the latest iteration of its New Balance collaboration – a link-up that’s been happening since SS22 – and with it came a brand new, potentially divisive style. For Miu Miu’s latest holiday collection, there was the classic 530 trainer, re-upped in black leather and vintage-effect colourways, but accompanying it was a pair we have now dubbed the Miu mule: all classic sneaker in the front, and flip-flop in the back. It’s a potentially polarising style, combining the impracticality of a clog and the functionality of a trainer, two features that aren’t a natural fit. But though the pair clearly upends everything we’ve come to expect from a pair of trainers, Miu Miu can practically do no wrong at the moment, so we’re sure they’ll be snapped up very quickly. As well as that, Mrs Prada has always been interested in fashion that doesn’t fit the stereotypical mould of beauty, and these trainers certainly fall into that category.
New Balance is of course no stranger to fashion collabs, having launched the 1906L sneaker earlier this year, in collaboration with Junya Watanabe. On its release, the trainer-loafer hybrid had a widespread polarising reaction, one that the design team spoke to us in detail about here. On the Miu Miu side, the brand is emerging from a triumphant third quarter of 2024, having topped The Lyst Index hottest brands in the world for Q3, thanks to its continued chokehold on fashion’s zeitgeist.
Scroll through the gallery above to see the new Miu Miu X New Balance 530 mule, and scroll through the gallery below for Miu Miu’s SS25 collection.