There’s something of a public foot fetish going on in the fashion world right now. This season, toes have been moodboarded, forecasted, might I say: hyped in every form and iteration. But when it comes down to the nitty-gritty, the endless search for the perfect flip-flops always circles back to Havaianas. The one everyone knows, loves, and owns. What is it, exactly, they’re doing right? Familiarity? Decades of soft conditioning? A kind of subconscious imprinting? With Havaianas digging their first model, the TRADI, out of the archives, the timeline clicks into place.
The original model dates back to 1962, and for over thirty years after its birth, it was the only slipper model Havaianas even made. In the meantime, the brand has grown to be the one and for most, the only, slipper brand that matters. Now that’s some heritage right there! The formula is almost aggressively simple: rubber sole, rice-grain texture, minimal straps. TRADI’s comeback is no big reinvention simply because there is no real need for one.
Today, wearing flip-flops is trendy because it gives you a kind of off-duty, casual-chic, slightly irreverent flair existing far beyond the beach. But before toes became front-row appropriate, there was just a Brazilian approach to footwear that prioritised ease. Functional, unbothered, casual – a democratic object. In Brazil, Havaianas claims near-total saturation — 95% of the Brazilian population would own at least one pair of Havaianas. Elsewhere, the numbers are less official but just as real. Even in Europe, where slippers aren’t exactly practical, they persist, and now they’re worn fashionably under suits to undo a little of that European stiffness.
More than sixty years later, the humble TRADI still lands as the clearest expression of what Havaianas is: simple, recognisable, inseparable from Brazilian culture. A slipper but also a blueprint for how something everyday becomes everywhere. Though toes might be extra on trend now, the TRADI heritage reminds us that letting the dogs out has been cool for over sixty years.
Words by Pykel van Latum
Images courtesy of Havaiana’s
