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That Balenciaga is an absurd shoe. It's the running shoe equivalent of a Gaudi hotel facade. It looks like it belongs on the cover of Yellow Submarine. The line

That Balenciaga is an absurd shoe. It's the running shoe equivalent of a Gaudi hotel facade. It looks like it belongs on the cover of Yellow Submarine. The lines are crazy. The curves of the sole section near the front of the shoe are in a complicated dialogue with the curves near the back. Check those tangents, man. If you've ever used something like illustrator, imagine where the spline controls would be. Then try the same with the Nike. They're different. I wouldn't pay $800 for those shoes because for me, $800 is a lot of money. If I were megarich and I needed sneakers maybe I'd pick the Balenciaga out of an appreciation for how they're pushing the edges of sneaker space. I'd be more likely to buy nice leather shoes because they'd suit me better. The reason you can't tell the difference between that and a generic sneaker for middle-aged men is that you're used to the higher fashion brands using a separate set of cultural symbols as their baseline instead of looking at the design itself. We've gone past that. Rich people aren't wearing wingtips to show how rich they are anymore. In fact, "formal" clothing and couture has long been a way to show you're on the way up, not that you're there. Old money doesn't try to keep up with fashion. Rich people want to wear sneakers, t-shirts, jeans, hoodies, and all the other normal sportswear that everybody else now wears but they want it to be interesting instead of generic. That's a valid role for a fashion designer. Not addressing that market would be idiotic. The reason it's easy to fake your way to the top of fashion week is actually that 90% of everything is shit, in every field and at every level, so there's no way to look at a given person's stuff and say definitively "nope, I can clearly tell you aren't successful by the way your clothing designs look". You might kick Michael Kors out by accident.

roymurdock 8y ago
> 90% of everything is shit in regulated/safety-critical industries such as automotive, aerospace & defense, medical, etc. where people's lives are at stake, 99% of end-user facing products are fantastic and you generally get what you pay for, with some minimum level of quality and manufacturer warranty in high fashion, the politics are so vicious because the stakes are so low. and it has stirred emotions here because nobody likes to feel left out, and that's basically the point of high fashion, to appoint a select group of people as "cool" because they "get it" and can afford hot labels I wouldn't say that this extends all through the art world - good design is key to a lot of functional and utility aspects of engineering or creating anything new. but nobody is going to be playing pick up basketball in their $800 balenciaga, or expecting any level of functionality/comfort from them besides fitting on their feet
- InitialLastName 8y ago
  > in regulated/safety-critical industries such as automotive, aerospace & defense, medical, etc... I don't know that I agree. I'm not familiar with with aerospace software, but I see a lot of the user-facing bits of both automotive and medical devices/software. While the bits that are safety-critical may be rock solid (I've yet to see it fail in person), the UI design, maintenance, and UX in general leaves a lot to be desired. For example, in my car, if the audio system is being driven from the bluetooth connection, you can't load the navigation screen. It will just spin forever. Switch to AM or FM radio, switch back to navigation, everything loads fine. How is that fantastic? As another example, one of my doctors' office recently switched to using this big heavy cart thing for taking vitals measurements. The device is expensive, so they don't have nearly as many as they might have patients at one time, so I had to wait until one was free. The UI was slow and clunky (at best). To beat it all, the last time I was there all of the machines were shut down at the same time for scheduled updates (which was required to be done at a certain time, while the office was open), so it was back to the thermometer and blood pressure cuffs for me.
  - solarkraft 8y ago
    UIs in highly reliable machinery feels old because they're in development for so long (plus the manufacturers are typically blind to software UX). Hopefully old car makers are currently considering easily updatable software (what an invention), so that we can have it in 3 years.
    - anyfoo 8y ago
      I think InitialLastName's point was (and it's my recent experience as well), that why the UI, in vehicles at least, may often be "modern" now to a relatively reasonable degree, the whole experience is often just shoddily put together. With obvious bugs that shouldn't have made it into a firmware version in the first place, and behind very strange user interaction concepts to begin with.
  - fhe 8y ago
    I concur. Last night I spent 30min trying to change the setting of my house heater. It's a Bosch heater, and one of the better quality brands. My! It bemuses how they could have gotten the UX so bad. It has only a handful of simple functions -- it reminded me of PG once mentioned he got an error message from trying to adjust settings on an oven. I have had similar experiences with my car. Did these designers even bother to use their own products.
kevin_thibedeau 8y ago
I don't think anyone wears those shoes. They're just for sneakerheads to collect. Then it's just a game of telling people what they should desire.
- tetrazine 8y ago
  Sorry... what? In fashionable places these are some of the most common high-end shoes I see people wearing. They're not very hard to buy or artificially scarce, just expensive, so they're not really a target for sneakerheads in the traditional sense of the word. They mostly care about specific colorways or variants that come in small quantities, or shoes that have just been released with constrained supply.
- barry-cotter 8y ago
  Sneaker heads buy Nike, or at a push Adidas. Sneakerhead.com has no results for Bakenciaga. It’s been a long time since the publication of Where'd You Get Those? 10th Anniversary Edition: New York City's Sneaker Culture: 1960-1987, but sneaker heads are about limited runs and artificial scarcity, not expensive shoes anyone with money can get.
- dorkwood 8y ago
  I only found out about Balenciaga recently, and since then I’ve seen two people wearing their gear: a young guy wearing their shoes, and a young girl wearing one of their sweaters. My theory is that they’re status symbols for kids with rich parents.
- wahnfrieden 8y ago
  I see them all over Toronto.
- sincerely 8y ago
  In general, sneakerheads wear the shoes they buy (unless it's something extremely rare like a 1985 Chicago AJ1).
lazerpants 8y ago
>In fact, "formal" clothing and couture has long been a way to show you're on the way up, not that you're there. Old money doesn't try to keep up with fashion. It's my job to deal with lots and lots of tremendously wealthy people (mostly billionaires). They usually wear formal or semi-formal clothes, or occasionally polos, etc. They do not wear Balenciaga, any of them, ever when I see them, in business environments or casual ones. On average they are older, but even the younger ones I know don't. In NYC the people I see in Balenciaga, Rick Owens, etc., work in fashion, or are European tourists.
- FabHK 8y ago
  > formal or semi-formal clothes, Are you actually referring to formal - formal (=full dress, ie morning dress/Cutaway (day) and white tie/tailcoat/Frack (eve)) and - semi-formal (=half dress, ie stroller/Stresemann (day) and black tie/tux/Smoking (eve)) attire, or informal formal (ie suits)?
  - lazerpants 8y ago
    Informal formal, mostly. But sometimes semi-formal for events.
  - komali2 8y ago
    Er, haven't those definitions been out of date for at least a decade, if not 3? If an office policy is semi formal, do people turn up in a black tie? Why are black tie parties "black tie" parties and not "semi formal" parties? IMO you've listed "opera" followed by "black tie." "Formal" would be "a tie and jacket," "semi formal" would be a jacket without a tie, or (shudder) a tie without a jacket, and then business casual is where the polos come in.
    - Gokenstein 8y ago
      Ugh, this is all stressing me out. I have an interview with a tech company in NY that interfaces with the fashion industry and I've worked from home for the past 3 years. My wardrobe consists of 3 pairs of jeans, 2 dad sweaters, 15 tshirts from various coffee shops and festivals, and 1 pair of target knock off slip on boat shoes.
vertline3 8y ago
It's a Veblen good and that's why the price is absurd.
kelvin0 8y ago
I went to look at pictures of the 'Balenciaga',it's an orthopedist's worse nightmare. Pretty sure it can cause serious injuries if you ever wear such a monstrosity.
craftyguy 8y ago
> That Balenciaga is an absurd shoe Looks like it would make a decent snowshoe though. Not a great one, but with such a large surface area for the sole it would be sufficient for walking around. I'd still rather spend the $800 on several pairs of real snowshoes and/or some x-country skiis.
skookumchuck 8y ago
It reminds me of Homer Simpson's car: http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/The_Homer http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/The_Homer

roymurdock 8y ago

> 90% of everything is shit in regulated/safety-critical industries such as automotive, aerospace & defense, medical, etc. where people's lives are at stake, 99% of end-user facing products are fantastic and you generally get what you pay for, with some minimum level of quality and manufacturer warranty in high fashion, the politics are so vicious because the stakes are so low. and it has stirred emotions here because nobody likes to feel left out, and that's basically the point of high fashion, to appoint a select group of people as "cool" because they "get it" and can afford hot labels I wouldn't say that this extends all through the art world - good design is key to a lot of functional and utility aspects of engineering or creating anything new. but nobody is going to be playing pick up basketball in their $800 balenciaga, or expecting any level of functionality/comfort from them besides fitting on their feet

InitialLastName 8y ago
> in regulated/safety-critical industries such as automotive, aerospace & defense, medical, etc... I don't know that I agree. I'm not familiar with with aerospace software, but I see a lot of the user-facing bits of both automotive and medical devices/software. While the bits that are safety-critical may be rock solid (I've yet to see it fail in person), the UI design, maintenance, and UX in general leaves a lot to be desired. For example, in my car, if the audio system is being driven from the bluetooth connection, you can't load the navigation screen. It will just spin forever. Switch to AM or FM radio, switch back to navigation, everything loads fine. How is that fantastic? As another example, one of my doctors' office recently switched to using this big heavy cart thing for taking vitals measurements. The device is expensive, so they don't have nearly as many as they might have patients at one time, so I had to wait until one was free. The UI was slow and clunky (at best). To beat it all, the last time I was there all of the machines were shut down at the same time for scheduled updates (which was required to be done at a certain time, while the office was open), so it was back to the thermometer and blood pressure cuffs for me.
- solarkraft 8y ago
  UIs in highly reliable machinery feels old because they're in development for so long (plus the manufacturers are typically blind to software UX). Hopefully old car makers are currently considering easily updatable software (what an invention), so that we can have it in 3 years.
  - anyfoo 8y ago
    I think InitialLastName's point was (and it's my recent experience as well), that why the UI, in vehicles at least, may often be "modern" now to a relatively reasonable degree, the whole experience is often just shoddily put together. With obvious bugs that shouldn't have made it into a firmware version in the first place, and behind very strange user interaction concepts to begin with.
- fhe 8y ago
  I concur. Last night I spent 30min trying to change the setting of my house heater. It's a Bosch heater, and one of the better quality brands. My! It bemuses how they could have gotten the UX so bad. It has only a handful of simple functions -- it reminded me of PG once mentioned he got an error message from trying to adjust settings on an oven. I have had similar experiences with my car. Did these designers even bother to use their own products.

kevin_thibedeau 8y ago

I don't think anyone wears those shoes. They're just for sneakerheads to collect. Then it's just a game of telling people what they should desire.

tetrazine 8y ago
Sorry... what? In fashionable places these are some of the most common high-end shoes I see people wearing. They're not very hard to buy or artificially scarce, just expensive, so they're not really a target for sneakerheads in the traditional sense of the word. They mostly care about specific colorways or variants that come in small quantities, or shoes that have just been released with constrained supply.
barry-cotter 8y ago
Sneaker heads buy Nike, or at a push Adidas. Sneakerhead.com has no results for Bakenciaga. It’s been a long time since the publication of Where'd You Get Those? 10th Anniversary Edition: New York City's Sneaker Culture: 1960-1987, but sneaker heads are about limited runs and artificial scarcity, not expensive shoes anyone with money can get.
dorkwood 8y ago
I only found out about Balenciaga recently, and since then I’ve seen two people wearing their gear: a young guy wearing their shoes, and a young girl wearing one of their sweaters. My theory is that they’re status symbols for kids with rich parents.
wahnfrieden 8y ago
I see them all over Toronto.
sincerely 8y ago
In general, sneakerheads wear the shoes they buy (unless it's something extremely rare like a 1985 Chicago AJ1).

lazerpants 8y ago

>In fact, "formal" clothing and couture has long been a way to show you're on the way up, not that you're there. Old money doesn't try to keep up with fashion. It's my job to deal with lots and lots of tremendously wealthy people (mostly billionaires). They usually wear formal or semi-formal clothes, or occasionally polos, etc. They do not wear Balenciaga, any of them, ever when I see them, in business environments or casual ones. On average they are older, but even the younger ones I know don't. In NYC the people I see in Balenciaga, Rick Owens, etc., work in fashion, or are European tourists.

FabHK 8y ago
> formal or semi-formal clothes, Are you actually referring to formal - formal (=full dress, ie morning dress/Cutaway (day) and white tie/tailcoat/Frack (eve)) and - semi-formal (=half dress, ie stroller/Stresemann (day) and black tie/tux/Smoking (eve)) attire, or informal formal (ie suits)?
- lazerpants 8y ago
  Informal formal, mostly. But sometimes semi-formal for events.
- komali2 8y ago
  Er, haven't those definitions been out of date for at least a decade, if not 3? If an office policy is semi formal, do people turn up in a black tie? Why are black tie parties "black tie" parties and not "semi formal" parties? IMO you've listed "opera" followed by "black tie." "Formal" would be "a tie and jacket," "semi formal" would be a jacket without a tie, or (shudder) a tie without a jacket, and then business casual is where the polos come in.
  - Gokenstein 8y ago
    Ugh, this is all stressing me out. I have an interview with a tech company in NY that interfaces with the fashion industry and I've worked from home for the past 3 years. My wardrobe consists of 3 pairs of jeans, 2 dad sweaters, 15 tshirts from various coffee shops and festivals, and 1 pair of target knock off slip on boat shoes.

vertline3 8y ago

It's a Veblen good and that's why the price is absurd.

kelvin0 8y ago

I went to look at pictures of the 'Balenciaga',it's an orthopedist's worse nightmare. Pretty sure it can cause serious injuries if you ever wear such a monstrosity.

craftyguy 8y ago

> That Balenciaga is an absurd shoe Looks like it would make a decent snowshoe though. Not a great one, but with such a large surface area for the sole it would be sufficient for walking around. I'd still rather spend the $800 on several pairs of real snowshoes and/or some x-country skiis.

skookumchuck 8y ago

It reminds me of Homer Simpson's car: http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/The_Homer http://simpsons.wikia.com/wiki/The_Homer