Thoughts and prayers go out to Katie Holmes’s Miu Miu ballerinas, which are among the hardest working shoes in show business. These industrious flats have been a constant in the actor’s wardrobe since surfacing in Miuccia Prada’s spring/summer 2016 collection, and were truffled out on at least two occasions in the last week alone: first at the Blink Twice after-parties, and then for a stroll around New York yesterday afternoon. (See the photos here.)
Here is a non-exhaustive list of the other events these shoes have appeared at: a Manhattan pap walk earlier this month; an American Ballet Theatre performance of Like Water For Chocolate and the Theatre World Awards in June 2023; and Alan Cummings’s cabaret show in March 2024. The patent leather surface has, for reasons that are obvious, begun to peel from the toes. But this, to me, is a shoe in its ideal state, well-weathered in a way that says, “I lead a rich outer-life.”
There is no point being precious about fashion when clothes are there to be lived in. That Katie Holmes—who I presume has box-fresh ballet flats on tap—should return to these soon-disintegrating slippers reminds me of how the Olsens give their Birkin bags permission to age and Emily Ratajkowski’s wrinkled loafers. It’s a point worth considering: a raddled item that’s been worn umpteen times is a much more potent status symbol than purchasing a T-shirt emblazoned with the words “Monaco Yacht Club” or something.
This article first appeared on British Vogue.
