BY DESIGN : Summer Boot Camp : They’re big, heavy and not just for soldiers anymore. Oh, and get this: Commando boots go with everything.
That’s one big, bad, ugly boot.
With its pliable canvas top, squishy lug soles and rubber toe caps, the summer commando looks like this sea son’s answer to cruel, crimpy shoes. Despite what some call its “ugly auto-mechanic” appearance, this tractor tire of a boot has wiggled its way onto the feet of women, men and children.
“I resisted buying them for a long time because they’re very unattractive and my husband thought they were ugly,” says Jeanne Baruch, who has a pair of black, ankle-high Galibier boots ($125). “I was so excited the first day I got them, I left the box open and my cat sprayed all over them,” she adds, sounding mildly embarrassed. “Now, I have fashionable but stinky feet.”
The boot--which comes in low-top, ankle-high or pole-climber (calf-high) styles--is surprisingly versatile. Women pair them with short dresses and vintage granny dresses as well as with denim shorts and Ts or leggings and oversize jackets. Men and children wear them with khakis, shorts, jeans and sweat pants.
They’re so comfortable, fans say, that other shoes lose their appeal. “Once I started wearing rubber soles, I never wanted to go back to my cowboy boots and Doc Martens because my feet would ache all the time,” Baruch says.
The commando boot is a fashion that, militaristically speaking, followed function. It was created in 1947 by Palladium, a French company that originally made rubber tires and gloves, and was first worn by French Foreign Legion soldiers stationed in Southeast Asia.
Palladium continued to make the boots for the military and eventually adapted the design for the junior fashion market in the early ‘80s. A hit in Europe for some time, designers have been trotting out the boot each fall for four years, but it caught on here only last year.
“You couldn’t give it away for a while, but it’s a trend that is reaching a peak now and all the designers going after it,” says Dana Taryn, editor for the Tobe Report, a New York-based trend-watching publication.
“It’s part of a utilitarian, durable couture that guys and girls have been going back to, with overalls, khakis, chinos, dickeys and construction worker jackets,” Taryn explains.
Palladium, one of the pricier labels on the market at about $90 to $100, claims to have perfected the science of vulcanizing (baking) the injection-molded sole onto the canvas top. But Guess, JCPenney, Nine West, Keds (for children) and many other companies are pumping out their impressions of the desert commando boot and shoe.
A growing favoritism of indestructible, utilitarian boots among teen-agers and twentysomethings in part inspired the creation of Guess Athletic, a licensee of Guess started by ex-Nike executives two years ago. Its “Flatrock” for men and “Dakota” for women ($40-$50) have been bestsellers in the line of rugged shoes and boots.
“They go with everything and you can put on as many socks as you like with these because there is so much room in them,” says Jean Parker, an 18-year-old college student spotted recently in black-on-black Dakotas with white cotton sport socks, denim short shorts and an oversize sweat shirt. “They are so comfortable.”
But despite the canvas commandos’ commercial success, they are not for the faint of foot--or ego.
“I wear them with dresses at work (in a medical office) and they laugh at me,” says Diane Chabot, 24, of her off-white low-tops.
Still, she says, “I want to get another pair in white. What can I say? I followed the trend. The goofier the look and the more clashing it is, is what’s vogue. It’s scary.”
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Location courtesy of Tumbleweed Junction, Arleta
