Men who are looking for a quick, inexpensive way to give some “pop” to their shoes, from classic oxfords to casual desert boots, are looking to their laces.
Brightly coloured laces that aren’t co-ordinated to anything in the rest of the outfit leap off the pavement, grab hold of the eye and add flare to footwear.
“It’s just for a little pop-out on something like a classic brogue,” said Jordan Stout, manager of Still Life for Him, 551 Johnson St.
“With any type of classic oxford, you can just switch out the laces for a bit of colour,” added Stout, who sells a brand of waxed cotton laces called Benjos for $8 a pair, making this colour splash an affordable way to bring life to even a battered pair of casual shoes.
Chukkas, like the well-known desert boot with its crepe soles, are shoes that Stout has dressed up for customers with coloured laces.
Meanwhile, across the street at 550 Johnson St., Still Life for Her store manager Alex Chichak said women are also opting for these quick and inexpensive accessories.
Chichak said Still Life for Her hasn’t had the laces on display for about a year. Shoe makers, however, seem to have discovered the device.
For example, his store now has a tan leather women’s shoe in stock that comes with laces in two colours — matching tan and bright orange.
“It’s super fun and it’s not a super-expensive way for a [shoemaker] to do that,” Chichak said. “It gives us all a bit more interest.”
Another Victoria men’s wear store, Outlooks for Men, 534 Yates St., is selling laces called Color for the Sole. They come five to a box — green, purple, blue, orange and red — for $25.
Outlooks owner Dale Olsen said lots of coloured laces are now on the market, with prices ranging up to about $20 for a single pair.
“I couldn’t get my head around that,” he said.
Olsen said he sees coloured laces as an easy and inexpensive way to bring some interest to a look. But price them too high and it spoils the fun.
The laces can be worn at black-tie events such as a wedding or the opera, or to backyard barbecues, where they can kick it up a notch on canvas deck shoes.
Olsen says the laces have an Italian influence — an affection for colour and a lack of regard for co-ordination with the rest of an ensemble.
“The Italians love colour and they can get almost kooky about it,” Olsen said.
“An Italian will have no fear about a pocket square that has no connection to anything else — the tie, the belt, the shirt,” he said.
“They just like to ‘pop’ their look.”
And the coloured laces do draw attention. Recently, Olsen said, he was walking the streets of Seattle in a pair of clunky, standard brogues, shoes that normally wouldn’t raise much notice. But he had tied them up with some bright red laces.
Somebody walked by and said, “Love your shoes.”
“The shoes wouldn’t normally get much notice, but that little pop of colour brings it on.”