The $22 Plastic Sandals Art Directors, Curators, and Set Designers Swear By
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We noticed art director and stylistTessa Watsonwearing these crisscross plastic slides with a woven texture and asked her about them for last week’s issue ofSecretStrategist. They reminded us of house slippers your uncle would wear, but there was something appealing about them nonetheless. She told us that she had first seen them on curatorLisa Rybovich Crallé, and then again on prop stylistMaggie Lindsey. “I realized that there must be something more to these unassuming slippers,” she said.
They may look like “regular-schmegular granny plastic sides,” according to Watson, but they’re actually made in Buford, Georgia, by a company calledOkabashithat has been around since 1984. The name is inspired by the Japanese concept of wellness, and the sandals are made of U.S.-produced bio-based material, mostly soy, and they’re recyclable. Okabashi’s original designs incorporate elements of reflexology, and the shoes today have arch support, a comfortable heel cup, and massage beads. So maybe they’re not so far off from orthopedic shoes that the elderly favor after all.
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New to us, we were curious about how Crallé and Lindsey first came across the sandals, so I reached out to them. “I bought my first pair of Okabashis in the late ’90s, at the local CVS near my high school in South Florida,” Crallé tells us. Lindsey also found them at the drugstore: “One day I was lugging my laundry to a laundromat in San Francisco, wearing my very old clogs that I really should have given up on long before because they were stretched out with a worn-out toe in one shoe, and while I was waiting for the dryer to be done, I went into a Walgreens, where I stumbled upon a rack of Okabashi sandals. I was first drawn to them because they were the exact shape of my foot!” Lindsey slipped one on and found that they “fit perfectly,” bought them on the spot, and walked out of the store wearing them.
Crallé, who liked “their practical, no-nonsense quality, their price (still less than $30, decades later), and, above all, their comfort,” has two pairs. The toffee cross-straps are her studio shoes, which she’s had for many years. “They’re caked in globs of plaster and paint, and their soles are beginning to fall apart,” she says. She also has a nice pair in black “for everywhere else — they have a timeless charm.”
After Lindsey got hers, they’ve become a staple. “I am a bit of a uniform type of person. I have the items I like, whether it be my Sven clogs, vintage Levi’s, or button-down shirts. I have what I like, and I stick to it,” she says. “I’ve got my mom and sisters wearing them; I give them to friends. They are the perfect set shoe, pool shoe, around-the-house shoe. I’ve packed them while traveling because they are light and comfortable.”
Watson also travels with her Okabashis and keeps them in her styling kit for on-location jobs because they’re so easy to pack. “I tend to wear them with socks (Japanese or Italian thin socks for a chic and easy slip in and out for standing on sofas to hold in art for a photo),” she says. “I also bring them to the pool, which I try to go to whether I’m on location or at home in New York City and Oakland.”
All three women wear the cross-strap sandal, but there are many more styles available, including flip-flops and slides and even ballet flats. Many of the women’s shoes have a little wedge sole. They definitely fall into the ugly-cute category of footwear, and they might require a bit of styling. But if you squint, thesecoral-and-black flip-flopslook a bit like The Row’s. Theseflip-flops with a medium-height wedgein black would look cute with big ’90s-era cargo shorts.
Regardless of how you might feel about them, they are comfortable. Strategist deputy editor Simone Kitchens bought a pair to try for herself. “They have a really solid base and a molded footbed,” she says. “The plastic is super-smooth, and I was really surprised by how soft the plastic felt. It feels like rubber, not hard plastic, and it doesn’t rub.” As someoneconstantly on the huntfor the next“It” sandal of the summerwhoalsohas foot issues, I may just have to order a pair.
Other intriguing Okabashi sandals
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A two-tone flip-flop reminiscent of The Row.
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