The Strange Rebirth of a Sandal
In a yet another ironic twist, a new trend shook the fashion world: plastic sandals in many different colors, fastened with a strap. Perfect for a stroll on the beach and water resistant. From celebrities to high fashion, it’s all over the place: Katy Perry put them in her own digital shop window, ensuring future customers they “won’t need fishing for compliments.”
You certainly wouldn’t get compliments from me. For those unfamiliar with the background story, this particular model was a summer footwear staple in former Yugoslavia and you could see countless people wearing them on the Adriatic coast. Especially kids, though I don’t remember having worn them. It’s one of the many things we since forgot about yet we shouldn’t have.
The original brand was Jugoplastika, a big pre-war company in Split famous for rubber and plastic products, as well as the local basketball team that was named after it. There were 13,000 empleyees a range of 3200 products including bags, clothes, shoes, toys etc. It was practically a synonym for some things we used in our everyday lives and it wouldn’t be a mistake to say it’s still the case nowadays. The demise of the company after the fall of Yugoslavia saw it fall victim to corruption and politics. Former workers still fondly remember their time and experiences there. Gucci’s new sandals are really something else. A case study of the difference between the life of former working-class and capitalist consumerism.
You’ve all been taken for a ride. Wanna know why? The price of the original Jugoplastika sandals was- wait for it- less than 6 dollars. Now, strip off a layer of retro nostalgia, add a designer label on top and you get to pay almost 500 dollars for basically the same thing. I can already imagine eBay full of second-hand shoes where owners will try to make a good deal on the wave of the current craze for something they probably still got sitting in a box in their garage. That’s a bold counterargument against minimalism. You too might have something that’s about to become a celebrity trend. It’s in full swing in other fields, like product design. A few days ago, in an antique shop, I found desk lamps and cord phones from the 1960s. The owner makes a pretty buck selling them and I’m not surprised at all.
Before we write them off and decide to ship them off to garbage disposal or a second hand shop, we should remember that trends are like vampires: they usually come back to life. I have no idea what kind of domino-effect created the current avalanche of the seemingly plain Yugoslavian sandal reincarnated in fancy shop windows.
One thing is for sure: you won’t catch me wearing either of them. There’s a lot of creative heritage we’re taking for granted. Especially from Jugokeramika, a brand behind countless collections of tableware and coffee sets that are on every hipster’s wishlist. Yugoslavian product design is still relatively obscure when compared to others on the market, so you don’t have to pay a fortune for a teapot. I have a red sugar bowl which I now use for my keys. It sits there, close to my 1980s phone which is cherished like a museum piece though out of use.
From restaurants, hotels to your own cupboard, Jugokeramika was omnipresent and good quality. You will find people who say that the economy back then went south because products didn’t have an expiration date as we’re used to in the 21st century. Just look at your smartphone: within 24 hours of buying it, there’s already an updated model on the shelves.
In my kitchen, there’s a refrigerator almost as old as myself. It’s still working perfectly fine while the other one is almost beyond salvation, though much younger. Replacement parts are almost impossible to find, a less than subtle nudge to give up and buy a new one. It makes me want to stick to the old guy even more so. They’re not getting my money.
The sandals from Split aren’t stuff of fairytales. It took the whiff of a nose from the fashion industry to turn into the modern glass slipper. They wouldn’t take you to Prince Charming but back into the 1980s, between the fragrant pines on a smalltown beach. In your portable freezer, instead of prosecco, there would be cans of chicken paste, beer, a few tomatoes or a watermelon. Nothing fancy.
The freezer would have probably come from the same place like your sandals or that inflatable beach matress you’ve had for years. You wouldn’t spare a thought on it until you’d have to replace it. Imagine having this approach in relationships, what a hoot it would be. Having an asshole doesn’t automatically give you permission to act like one as well. You don’t need to ask for trouble to deserve it.
After the news broke, Croatian media were overwhelmed with surprise, disbelief and pride. Mostly because the majority of people didn’t see any real value in it. It served a purpose but that’s all there was to it. After I saw the preposterous pricetags, I asked my friends if any still had them. Nah. They either threw them away or misplaced them somewhere. It speaks volumes about our relationship to not only our own culture but society too. Don’t make a mistake- they might be cheap and ugly, but they were simultaneously a symbol. Not in the modern sense of it, since our symbols are rarely affordable. That’s why Katy Perry’s sudden re-branding of the original sounds like a joke, but so does most of fashion in this day and age.
This rebirth of a shoe consigned to the dustbin of style isn’t just a curious anecdote about fashion. It’s also a form of cultural appropriation which turned something as working-class as pizza into a fancy dish on the menu of Michelin restaurants. It’s rooted in the concept of gentrification as well. Elites are slowly conquering the space created as an antithesis of their own.
Former factories are turned into galleries and quirky nightclubs. Even farts must be vegan in this environment that can’t handle anything authentic, unless re-packaged to fit into the new narrative. There’s little space for the truth behind their shiny illusion. Fortunately, unlike the truth, illusions tend to wear off. The root might be cut off, but the crown hasn’t dried up.
