Kicks, sneaks, runners, dunks - all urban slang for fashionable footwear. Just like fitted baseball caps, there’s a huge market surrounding sneakers that’s filled with limited-edition releases, exclusives, and over-the-top color variants. The affectionately-titled “sneakerhead’ culture tends to target throwback classics and artistically enhanced footwear that are hard to find and equally expensive. Here’s a few:

For those of us serious about dance - not capital-D Dance in a studio with a bar and a requisite body dysmorphic disorder, but dance! in a space packed with friends, no restraints, no regrets, and no cover - 2 things are essential: amazing music and room to move. Music meaning sick beats that not only make you want to dance, but make you have to dance, and room to move as in hot, free-wheeling joy-clothes and dancing shoes that never hold you back.

See more of my D.A.N.C.E. list at ThisNext.

After a successful run as a marketing consultant on Wall Street, it was time for Miss Meghan to pursue her life-long obsession with shoes.  Now we know her as America’s Shoe Expert, a shoe therapist and doyenne, the fashion authority of all things shoe. From her hit television show Shoe Therapy ™ on the Home Shopping Network, to her podcast series Shoe are You?™ on iTunes, thousands of women across the globe pour out their shoe stories to learn key tips and strategies on finding the latest shoes. When Miss Meghan isn’t dispensing celebrity shoe secrets and teaching us how to walk in stilettos, she can be found rounding up the latest finds on ThisNext. We caught up with this ‘sole therapist’ for the latest trends in the shoe department:

TN:  Any sneak previews you can share with ThisNext readers?
MM:  Well, I can say that there is a very hot ankle boot we’ll be featuring on the debut of my new show on Home Shopping Network on the 20th (8 pm). It is a patent bootie with a suede cuff that has this super sexy slit up the front. Is very eighties but with a cool modern heel. I looove it! And keep tuning in to my show Shoe Therapy on HSN because we are going to be bringing people some really hot shoes this Fall and Winter and a lot of hilarious surprises.

TN:  Biggest response a blog post of yours has received from consumers?
MM:  We got a lot of response from my Shoe are You? podcast with Jason and Randy Sklar — they have a huuuge following and the podcast was so hilarious, I practically stopped interviewing because I was just laughing so hard. You can check it out here or on iTunes.

...continued: Who is Miss Meghan?

Simple is a nice little shoe company that makes shoes for a happy planet. They make eco-friendly shoes that don’t sacrifice style for going green. The shoe featured here is the Toega slip-ons. Here are the ingredients used to make the shoes: ‘crepe is a natural rubber that is tapped from the hevea tree. it makes a really squishy outsole!’ the glues used are water based, ‘bamboo is an endless resource because it is so plentiful. they use it as a super soft lining in some of their shoes!’ and organic cotton is used to linen the uppers. The shoes look real comortable and can double as casual and formal wear. They are available in chocolate, tan and jungle colors. $85.00

productdose

Looks like Marc-y Marc Jacobs went Single White Female on Chuck Taylor:

Marc by Marc Jacobs’ Converses canvas baseball boots are an unglossy, boss black that shadow the classic sneaker, echoing the timeless design while lacing up to the ankle, sealing themselves with a subtle circle.

And though the sneaks snuck below their original $295 tag at Net-a-Porter’s summer sale, they’re still a buck-seventy-five. Which means they’re cheaper than a keychain by Monsieur Louis.

But if a girly girl’s paying that much for flats, for shoes sans an artful arch, they ought to magically stretch your legs long like Giselle’s. Or at least be stamped gold with “MARC JACOBS,” so people know why you’re wearing ugly sneaks.

Maybe it’s the heat turning hot, but lately I’m stripping my life even leaner, flipping through my calendar and closet and weighing what’s worth less that I ought to toss, lightening my life so it’s only heavy with high quality.

I delete appointments that won’t bring me pure pleasure or profit, I edit out any duds that aren’t silk softly flattering my bod, and I look at my fat platforms and consider swapping them out for long lean lines of Gianvito Rossi’s “Summer Strass” sandals.

The thinnest four-inch heel supports an ambitious arch, a clean curve that your foot’s laced to with two black lines. Boss with its brains and beauty, Gianvito Rossi’s sandals are a reminder of how life should style: efficient intelligence that’s clean of anything but form happily married to function.

Rich in its minimalism, I’m inspired—

Maybe I’ll swap soy lattes for snorting lines of espresso grounds.

[Via KRiSTOPHER DUKES.com]

Always in frilly flapper frocks and impractical hooker heels, eyes smoked out from Sunday to next Saturday, 9 a.m. to 9 p.m.—

I look too much like a prissy Krissy for people to realize I think like a Kristopher: shopping is an errand, not a competitive sport; my bedhead, Brigette Bardot bun is less sex kitten and more a time saver; and packing for travel isn’t about maxing out my luggage, but minimizing my package.  Gear for 48 hours of business in New York and fluffy stuff for four-day weekend in San Francisco jam into my favorite white, blackhole of a bag: a few dresses, tiny triangles of underwear, and I rock a single pair of heels. And while I don’t mind Starbucksing on Sunday a.m. in rhinestoned platforms, Jour & Nuit’s convertible shoes, heels designed to get you through day and night, are a bosser option.

Each shoe features patent-pending, removable straps to control the glam factor of platform sandals and kitten heels: pick between a sleeky chic, eel-skin strap or a rhinestoned one, enjoy your options—

Style “jour” for few stares at the subway, go “nuit” and have a fellas pardon their French for you. 

[Via Shoewawa]

Just in time for summer, Y to the S to the L pimps another tribute to his “Tribute” It shoe —

Closed-toe and suede piped with patent leather, it’s the perfect platform for me to preach upon: the same ladies paying tribute to YSL’s “Tribute” with eBay fees and waste-of-time wait lists will be fawning over flats come fall double-oh-seven. Less because they can’t rock 75mm stilletto — I never saw that wobbling, no worries, lovely — and more because fashion is really that O. Wildean world in which it’s so ugly they must alter it every six months, and even more because they’ve already traded their drainpipe denim they swore they never wore for an equally unflattering pair of extra-wide jeans.

Even when fashion falls back on flats — give it five — I’m sticking to stylized stilts.

I’ve always dug drag queen-high heels more out of a masculine desire to tower as tall as possible, and less out of a femme concern of what other ladies might think, or even out of vague vanity for my legs.

Though Monsieur YSL does pay glorious tribute to both.

A collaboration between an eco-friendly shoe company: Terra Plana and industrial designer Matthew Harrison, has yielded the “Dopies” made from a single sole that folds up between the toes, this sandals might have been a collection from the flintstones. They are available in various colors, and did I mention that they are environmental friendly [made from recycled foam rubber]. Available on-line or in NYC at the Terra Plana Store.

Coolhunting

Mink-laced sandals seem the ultimate in gratuitous fur, in lavish, anti-Bambi luxe, but really - It’s only because your K loves animals more than PETA that she’s lusting for these Giuseppe Zanotti purple velvet and mink babies, baby.

I’d love to add a new pet to the menagerie that is my closet - Ostrich arm candy, Marc-y Marc Jacobs leopard-print trenchcoats, snaky clutches, ponyskin pumps, Mongolian lamb capelets crowd my zoo thus far.

— And my building doesn’t allow poodles.

I abhor my toes. They’re weird and unpretty and I don’t want anyone to ever have to look at them, which is kind of a problem come spring and summer. Because I can’t get with open-toed sandals of any kind, my warm-weather daytime shoe selection tends to be severely limited. And don’t even speak the words “flip flops” to me, or I just might break out in hives or something.

A couple years ago I discovered a pair of darling, open-heel ballet shoes from Rocket Dog, but now they’re faded and falling apart and in desperate need of replacement. My number-one candidate at the moment: The new Flonica shoe from Royal Elastics, in happy chili/medium-orange.

In addition to being so comfy and sporty-cute, the Flonica features a sockliner made with die-cut foam, which wicks away sweat and helps enhance breathability. So much better than clunking around the city in sneakers on a sweaty day, and they might even make sense for strolling the beach.

You’re thinking this rum and Coked up flip-flop is the stuff of a surfing art school student’s PhotoShop fun?

Nay, unlike La Lohan’s latest with Miu Miu, Reef’s “Dram” sandal is for real, and possibly your boy’s BFF come spring break. According to Reef’s e-boutique, its “polyurethane encapsulated canteen in heel has a screw cap” that “opens with included exclusive Reef church key/fin key.” 

Stashing an aiport security-approved 3 oz. of liquids, you may have found a way out of overpaying flight attendants for half-mixed cocktails on your way to Cabo.

Still, call your K old fashioned, but she’s sticking to stilettos and martini glasses.

 [Via ShoeBlogs.com]

There comes a time when spray-painting your shoes silver just doesn’t help you get dates.  Dior has a solution for guys like you (um, I mean ‘us’). View details.

Because you’ve a spring fever to grow up, stand taller, and hustle harder to reach and touch 24K sunshine.

Because spring fever has you itching to play your wide-open field smart, to enjoy your hot little body after being winter wrapped up for months, to know you’re vibing golden in the sun’s bright shine.

Because, whether swimming through spring fever or wading through winter, your K gets all hot and bothered by an arched sole and solid heel that’ll have her on her toes day to night.

Because —

Check these Fendi raffia platform sandals.

[Via Shoewawa]

Dearest Giuseppe Zanotti,

Because you know love isn’t all fuzzy feelings and soft talk -

Because you know how to please the ladies -

A red platform sole sliding into a black heel is pure wit, which balances your fetish for flirtation, the cherry red patent leather, the ankle straps; a classic peep toe flatters any girl’s legs; and a hard four-inch-plus heel will have you on your toes all night.

Because you know hard intelligence is as S-E-X-y as playing haute -

A classically hooker-high heel becomes cheeky chic in its Police’s “Roxanne” red, its glossy, flossy patent leather, and its dominatrix ankle strap against design details like a contast cone heel.

- I love you.

French kisses,

Your K

So I’m allergic to flats, to any shoe less than four-inches tall (along with T-shirts, and the idea of not wearing three coats of mascara).

Still, I understand a chic flat - maybe a ballet flat that’s Audrey Hepburn hip, or a modern mod Mary Jane - as a comfy alternative to skyscraper heels.

Well, almost.

Dip it in animal-print, and then things begin to make more sense to me.

...continued: Ooh La Love: Getting Down with Flats

Our own Alyson captured every lady’s current “Higher Calling,” a lust for platforms, and since too-tall shoes are far from going away come spring ‘07, I figured I’d sequel, and tell you -

Bruno Frisoni is my new Italiano lover.

“I’m speechless,” says Di Overton. “A part from to say this designer is Parisian - surprised?” 

Oui, oui, I am. No matter - check these Bruno Frisoni patent platform sandals and understand my obsession.

...continued: Ooh La Love: A Higher Calling, Part Deux

So I’m allergic to any shoe with a heel shorter than four-inches.

Galoshes are still super, ridiculously cute, and I will confess that during many a Manhattan rain fest leopard galoshes called to me.

But I bravely resisted, much to the distress of my over-worn, over-the-knee boots and their stacked wooden heel. 

Marc-y Marc Jacobs here looks like he may come to the rescue.

...continued: Ooh La Love: Play in Rain Boots

What with fashion blogs democratizing fashion and loosening the tyranny of fashion glossies, what with the celebration of cultivating personal style over wasting money on fleeting trends, over is the day of hard and fast style rules.

But every lady still needs at least one pair of 4” heels.

Forget the clunky wedges, chuck the chunky platforms - those are cute, but I’m thinking a pin-thin stiletto that make you stand taller and straighter, and watch your walk.

...continued: Wardrobe Staple: 4" Stiletto