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By Alissa Thomas

Shoes for art’s sake. Is this well-heeled fashion or modern art?

How cult designers are changing the shape of footwear

Inside glass pillars, curated along the sparse walls of a modern gallery is where you might expect to see these. Footwear creations conceptualized by an artist re-purposing the geometric shapes of Art Deco design and challenging the expected notion of what we know as fashion heels. Taking sculpted forms, sometimes matching, sometimes not, and giving it the practical purpose of walking around.

The stand-out shoe trend that is the ‘sculptural heel’ has been emerging for a couple of years. Whispers of it started back during the SS16 season as Vetements introduced their Pop Art cigarette-lighter boot and Prada debuted kitchsy kitten heels during its nana-chic nuance. Since then we’ve seen Saint Laurent bring the sexy laser-cut ‘YSL’ heel and Jimmy Choo do platforms with gradients of layered timber.

The look of the now, however, is being led by relative newcomers. Nouveau shoe designers like French-born Simon Porte Jacquemus and London-based, Korean national Rejina Pyo are leading the way when it comes to this statement look. The former widely followed for his mismatching block heels and the latter for her architecturally abstract mules and sling-backs. Also displaying an avant-garde approach lately is JW Anderson with his shiny gold cylinders and design house Neous who use Deco-inspired perspex spheres.

The streets outside London, Paris and Milan during the FW18 shows were awash with these non-boring heels. In fact, there seemed to be a minor trend war happening between those that opted for the much publicised ‘ugly’ sneaker and those in crafted mini-heels. In some styled-up looks, however, the two even seemed to be interchangeable. The A-list have jumped on board too, with Selena Gomez, Emily Ratajanowski and Beyonce all showing their love for Jacquemus’ shape-stacked, mismatching sling-backs on red carpets of late.