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The summer of 2023 will be remembered not for Beyoncé concerts or “Barbiecore,” but the wedge heel. At least, that is how it felt for those of us paid to write about the clothes celebrities are photographed in. Here is a non-exhaustive list of all the people who were papped wearing that once-maligned heel: Lily-Rose Depp, Nicola Peltz Beckham, Katie Holmes, Amal Clooney, Natalie Portman, and Catherine Zeta-Jones.
The omnipresence of the wedge–sometimes vertiginous and jet-setting but often orthopedic and ankle-supporting–set the wheels in motion for Chemena Kamali’s fall 2024 debut at Chloé. She invited a handful of bohemianites–among them Sienna Miller, Georgia May Jagger, Pat Cleveland, and Kiernan Shipka–to sit on the front row with their legs anchored by identical and hulking platform wedges. That image travelled long distances online–the It-shoe had (again) replaced the It-bag–and the Maxime Wedge Sandal sold out almost immediately on its release.
The might of that shoe has perhaps overshadowed its siblings. See: the Jeannette Wedge Clogs–more of a traditional but no less ankle-threatening silhouette–that Miller last night wore to attend the opening of the Treasure House Fair at the Royal Hospital in Chelsea, paired with a puff-sleeved skirt set from Rhode. She looked as though she had swapped wardrobes with any given member of this magazine’s editorial team. It is only a matter of time until Miller steps out in Chloé’s Judith Clog–a wooden kitten heel which is so wrong in all the right ways–that will doubtless be Kamali’s sleeper hit.