Lisa Armstrong
Why I’m finally learning to love white trainers
Idon’t know if it’s because I’m 20 years older and, therefore, can’t allow myself to settle into a style rut, but I’m finding it much harder to resist the cult of the white trainer than I did in the Nineties.
You may recall (please say you do) that the Nineties were the last time that white trainers were ubiquitous as a night and day look. Kate Moss in bias-cut maxi skirts and cropped Calvin Klein T-shirts. Plus trainers. All Saints in their combat pants. Plus trainers. Sporty Spice. God only knows what she was wearing, but the clue’s in the name: trainers were involved.
Maybe it was a bit of a London thing, because they sure as heck weren’t wearing trainers in Milan or on the Faubourg St Honoré. And provided you kept a steady eye on the pretty shoes and held your nerve, you could more or less navigate your style without touching on the sneaker, except in the gym, and even then there was always Pilates.
But now? The white sneaker is inescapable, and they certainly are wearing it on the Faubourg – and everywhere else. Received wisdom lays this mass breakout at the feet of Phoebe Philo, who, back in 2010, began championing white Stan Smiths. Where Philo trod, millions of navy jumper minimalists followed.
However, if the Stan Smith is a design icon of stunning simplicity and understatement – what Mies van der Rohe would have designed had he been working for Adidas – many of 2018’s white trainers are its antithesis. With their cartoonish tread-soles, pumped-up proportions and baroque details, they’re more like Blackpool Illuminations, with Trump Tower prices. Unless you have very long legs, they’re spectacularly unflattering too, because they sit so high up the ankle.
With function a low priority, the inflated prices are key to its virus-like spread. If you pay £1,080 for a jewel-strapped Gucci Flashtrek or £1,600 for Christian Louboutin’s crystal embellished ones (I am not making these up), it follows that you will prize them like nothing else in your shoe-drobe and will probably want to wear them for more than just squats.
The startling readiness of the fashion crowd to stump up big for limited edition white trainers has led to a sneaker Klondike, with every single brand, even those previously associated with ladylike heels, such as Jimmy Choo and LK Bennett, piling in. Sitting in a chichi Knightsbridge hairdresser the other day, I noticed that while the largely Middle Eastern clientele were still toting structured Fendi and Dior bags, they had all traded in their Valentino Rockstud stilettos for designer sneakers. White trainers are also very popular among those blissfully ignorant of all style diktats – middle-aged dads, toddlers, etc – so in that sense they’re truly democratic.
Hitherto hyped brands such as Vetements, which is seeing its growth stall in some countries, are, thanks to buoyant trainer sales, still able to post profits. One jaundiced retailer confided that among millennials, Balenciaga, a 99-year-old house founded by one of the greatest 20th-century couturiers, is primarily known as a label for evermore futuristic-looking sneakers. The bottom line is that the one It item currently uniting everyone from the front row to school mums and teenagers is the white trainer. This has been surprisingly hard for me. I love velvet trainers, Adidas’s coloured suede Gazelles, and Nike’s stretchy Flyknits, but I’ve always had a nails-on-blackboard reaction to the white incarnations. It’s probably because I was traumatised in PE as a child – and I’ve never had the requisite visual agility to flip from one aesthetic to another. If I thought something was hideous when I was seven, the chances are I still do.
But needs must. The past 14 days of fashion month have seen me diligently exercising my retinas to “get my eye in” because, no two ways about it, white trainers are the fastest, simplest way to update your favourite outfits. From feminine floaty dresses to denim, classic trouser suits to a leopard print jumpsuit, everything looks that bit more relaxed and less contrived (however contrived it really is) with white trainers.
If you’re looking for a sturdy, classic, pared back construction that’s ethically made and either completely white or with relatively discreet coloured strips, Veja’s, (from £95, at net-a-porter.com) are the favourites (and the ones I bought). If bright white seems too stark or high maintenance, Air & Grace has vintage white beauties (my eye’s definitely settling in), alongside animal prints and metallics that look good enough to turn even the most trainer-resistant (from £149, airandgracelondon.com). There are also some lovely Adidas Original Primeknits (stretchy, like Nike’s Flyknits) in a pale grey minky colour (£130, net-a-porter.com) which, implausible as it sounds, look positively luxurious.