In Praise of Sleepy Shoe Labels and Footwear Comebacks

Herbert Levine knew his way around a nasty shoe. Shout out to conceptual Robert Clergerie. And why is this majestic Jimmy Choo moment so good?

This past fashion week,

Leandra Medine Cohen

posted a photo of a clear pump with a piece of white string piped through the topline so the plastic could fasten around the foot like a crinkled rain bonnet. The nipple-ish heel was a curved little wooden stump and the sole resembled bubble wrap. The opening image to the rest of the slideshow was catnip to Instagram, but the shoe label’s name harkened back to the days of yore: The footwear was Herbert Levine, a dormant shoe brand now headed up by Trevor Houston, who is responsible for the fantastically saucy, sometimes downright fabulously nasty footwear of The Row and Khaite.

Herbert Levine plastic pumps at The Met (1965)

There’s a nice storyline behind this Herbert Levine hero piece, too: Search the Metropolitan Museum of Art, and you’ll find a plastic iteration from Herbert Levine from 1965 fashioned into a stiff ladylike heel. This was one of the original flaunt-your-piggies pump. And think about it…this was the mid-’60s! Imagine the see-through footwear with a naive little bobby sock—how perverse! Or sans anything to reveal those lacquered, wriggling toes! (You can find a wedge version on The RealReal for $245). How naughty!

The shoe brand was founded in 1948 by husband and wife duo Herbert and Beth Levine. During the mid to late ‘50s, the footwear was a staple in Vogue. They were fit for First Ladies like Jacqueline Kennedy and Ladybird Johnson, but there were radical designs, such as a Lucite heel with no screws showing. In the New York Times obituary on Herbert Levine in 1991, Mrs. Levine recalled the monumental creation of the screwless, Lucite heel: “He said ‘You just find a way’ and I did. I had to keep him amused. We had fun because he wouldn’t fire me if I did something nutty.’

That nutty phalangeal perseverance paid off. The brand won the Neiman-Marcus award and two Coty Awards for shoes that were backless, bejeweled, and the aforementioned transparent design. The shoes get wackier, too. He won an award for all-in-one-stretch boots and pants, as seen in a cream lace bodysuit and boots iteration from 1963, which resembles a Balenciaga design. Also rearing its bizarre head is a PVC mule with a faux grass sole from 1966. A golden mule with a snarling snout! A velvet slipper with a Fruit Roll-Up heel. Then, a sandal that descends into a mohawk of leather curls like orange peels.

Herbert Levine shoes at The Met

Currently, you can find the museum-worthy Herbert Levine shoes for under $250. A coquettish pump with a fur trim. Pink pumps with floral blooming from their tops.