My mom looked at me while I slipped on a pair leather sandals in our driveway last July. She paused midway through her walk to her car and told me “you’re not wearing those to Kevin’s graduation party.” First of all, I was. Second of all, I did. Nobody died, okay? Kevin graduated. But what mattered to me wasn’t whether the small tragedy of ruining a sunny day with “adulting” would actually happen, it was that she felt comfortable saying it at all.
It was saying it like I was about to commit a public decency crime. Sandals, for my mom, exist at the level of sandals are not okay, read your lease before you sign it. That’s how men’s sandals exist culturally right now, because we don’t like them. I didn’t like them. I bought four pairs of sandals in fourteen months and I’m still unpacking why I spent all that money to reach that conclusion.
The Math Says Yes, My Gut Still Says Maybe
I always start with cost per wear for anything, sandals completely threw me because the math is so bad. Like embarrassingly in my favor. I found a pair of leather slides at my church thrift store for six dollars, the Thursday afternoon restock guy clearly doesn’t understand Birkenstock resale value, and I’ve worn them probably ninety times across two summers. That works out to six cents a wear. SIX CENTS. I typed that into my phone twice because I didn’t believe it the first time and it came back correct both times.
Compare that to a pair of sneakers I bought for forty five dollars that I wear just as often, but sandals were never the financial question. Nobody’s mom pauses while leaving sandals at the bottom of their driveway over sneakers. I’ve validated for myself so many times over that sandals are hands down the cheapest thing in my wardrobe to own and wear. The hangup isn’t economical, it’s purely social and that’s a math problem I don’t have the equation for.
That, I think, was a while longer coming than I’ll admit. I kept checking and rechecking because I thought a better cost per wear would answer the cool question, and it won’t because nobody at Kevin’s graduation party cared that my amortized cost per use was better than everyone elses’ shoes, they cared “why is that grown man’s foot out.” Fair, it’s a valid point. dudes feet aren’t good, generally. Mine sure as heck isn’t. That’s why the sandals conversation always turns to pedicures ten minutes in, and will forever because I’ll admit I didn’t think about taking care of my feet at all before this experiment started and that was probably irresponsible of me considering how much time I’d already spent worrying about the shoe itself.
No. The math isn’t what’s going to solve the cool question. It just lowered the barrier enough for me to keep asking it, which could be worse I suppose.
What Actually Changed My Mind, and What Didn’t
What changed my mind wasn’t J Crew telling me boat shoes were cool again, it was DIY hotline. Work stuff. I’m an electrician and one day in July, it was ninety plus degrees with the sun basically cooking us at the top of a ladder, I noticed one of the older guys on the crew had on what I didn’t know at the time were Chacos but were work sandals, the ones with the strap over the top, not the slide style ones and he was laughing at a joke while everyone else’s boots were muffling our feet due to sweat. I asked him about them later that lunch and all he said was “boots are for winter, brother.” Like that was the obvious answer. I didn’t know him super well but man, I kept thinking about that comment.
That was when I started mentally dividing the “are sandals cool” question into two completely separate questions I had been butterfingers together. Sandal slides, the ones you wear to mail a letter or the pool, I never thought those were cool? They’re not cool, they’re utilitarian. Will they get the job done? Sure. Will they look good doing it? Do you think a tarp looks good walking down the street? Once I started asking myself that about sandals slides I realized nobody expects them to. But the ones with straps, built up soles, actual designs to them, that’s when sandals become footwear and less “what’s on your feet” and more “who are you wearing.”
I realized after that separation that three of my four pairs, and I bought four because at this point I’m definitely not buying any more sandals, three of my four were perfectly fine looking and one was the rubber slide pair from…let’s call it a rebuilding phase of my wardrobe. The distaste I had was really just me holding onto one bad experience with a pair of sandals I should’ve thrown out years ago. I built a whole worldview around sandals being dumb because of one shitty outfit I put together. Ask me if I’m alone in that…I am.
What didn’t change? My opinions on socks with sandals. I know grown men are doing it as fashion now. Don’t @ me in the comments I’ve scrolled through enough pants being defended on the internet to know I’ll lose that battle. But until that comes for me, I’m not ready for sandals. Socks and sandals are where that line is for me, mostly because I don’t want to push too hard in one season. One foot in the sandals pool at a time for me.
Are sandals cool. I’m not gonna lie enough to say yes like I can say it in print. But out loud to you at the bar?
Yes. The leather ones are cool, the ones that look like actual shoes are cool. The slap on with no support kind are not cool, because they’re not shoes. What I think happened is most of my disdain for sandals was around slides and not sandals as a whole. Once I cleared that mental dividing line away I was able to look at my sandals and ask myself if they were cool. Three out of four pairs are! Nobody cares about what you wear, probably. Not like you think they do.
Liam is a sparky from Birmingham who got into charity shopping during one very skint year and never really stopped. He works out the cost per wear on everything he buys, sometimes out loud, sometimes wrongly the first time.
