Saturday, March 9, 2013

Potato, Poh-tah-toh: The Return of the Lucite Heel

Left: Deena & Ozzy Clear-Heeled Sandal here, Right: Stuart Weitzman Theone Patent Leather Lucite Heel Sandal here

It seems that last year's Spring trend of lucite footwear and perspex accessories and accents has held up and carried into this year's fray of Spring trends. It's been poking its head out here and there (the raved-about Charlotte Olympia Pandora clutch is probably one of the sources of this trend's NOT eye-roll-inducing slight resurgence) but it looks slightly different than before (as it should).

I for one went crazy for it last year, when everyone else did (I still die for those 3.1 Phillip Lims—HELLO CINDERELLA) but after a while, once the plastic pandaemonium started to filter down to the masses, and appear across the full spectrum of designer to not-designer brands, I got a little sick of seeing it. I love him, but Jeffrey Campbell made me so sick of clear-heeled everythings that the trend became utterly intolerable for me to stand any longer, not to mention he rendered it impossible for me not to associate the trend with strippers once more. (The Fashion Week designers last year did such an astonishing job of dispelling the pole-dancing associations with see-through footwear and replacing them with a new and entirely chic re-imagined image, that the light-up, strawberry scented origins from whence the look came seemed a far-off memory. But alas, JC's over-studded, hyper-platformed aesthetic eventually swung the pendulum back to Stripperville.) And then, I forgot about it.

Fast-forward to now, when I was pleasantly surprised to stumble upon it again this season, and beyond that, not even the slightest bit annoyed. (I'm sure that's exactly the kind of reaction designers are hoping to induce with their wares: merely not-annoyed.) But the truth is, its decidedly more sheepish sequel this Spring has softened my hardened heart for the see-through trend, and has sweetened its way back onto my wantlist for Spring. I find the blush+lucite combination these two steppers are sporting to be rather pretty, and even prettier at about 1/5 of the price of those Stuart Weitzmans.

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