The Big Red Boots of MSCHF
Animated into reality, abstraction at whole new level, cartoon super mario kart big big chonky boots on my feet and well RED- is how I describe the MSCHF Big Red Boots.
The maker of these beautiful red chonks, Kevin Weisner, the creative director of MSCHF; miscellaneous mischief, an art and advertising collective based in New York. An experimental fashion brand or as one can say, a creative entity since they don’t like putting themselves under a label. From selling sneakers and the Jesus shoes (“what would Jesus wear”) to BIG FRUIT LOOPS and Horse flavoured chips, their advertising strategy is a work of wonders. A walk on water, as tasty as cake, an unbalanced breakfast yet thats what the likes of us, fashion enthusiasts wanna consume for each course of the meal.
“Cartoonishness is an abstraction that frees us from the constraints of reality,” the press release for the boots read. The boots are a descended inspiration of AstroBoy and Dora the Explorer’s monkey friend. The realm of cartoons where anything is possible, the most improbable scenarios, from defying gravitational postulations to flying just by flapping your hands, “If you kick someone in these boots, they go boing!”. Ronald McDonald in his yellow unitard and the big red boots, one of the OG games; subway surfers (i prefer associating these boots with subway surfers more than the face of Maccie Ds cz i was scared of that clown man but that never stopped me to click a pic with him).
The boots for me represent a vision where i am jumping on a trampoline bungee reaching the stars and back to earth and a complete jetpack joyride.
Just as soon as these boots were released, their popularity sky rocketed, imagine the scale shown in those early 2000s cartoons where the weight scale broke the machine after you hit it with a hammer and it kept going up till it reached the moon. Celebrities and instagram icons like WWE wrestler Seth Rollins, rapper Lil Wayne, rapper and singer Coi Leray, and numerous others were spotted wearing it right the next day, and well i would have been one of them too if i could afford these ‘super Mario Kart Astroboy boing boing RED boots’.
Model Sarah Snyder paired these monstrous big ‘reddies’ with a glossy red skirt and white semi sheer tights; TikTok star and model Wisdom Kaye styled them with oversized deconstructed shorts, a pair of shades and the most adorable looking beanie. (Honestly speaking this was my most favourite outfit- IT GAVEE!!!)
These 15 inch, 3 pound boots are made from TPU shell and EVA foam, so basically they are a compilation of rubber and plastic. The fashion, sorry, CREATIVE worlds ever growing fascination with the tech and digital world plays a focal role in the birth of these boots and even more so with their increasing popularity, playing right into the field of surrealism and imagination, giving everyone a chance to live their childhood dreams in some way (pretending you are astro boy or in Mario Kart world, i know I’d definitely pretend and go ‘vroom vroom’ while walking on a street) (ill obviously do this in my head, but hey! Its fun and what’s life if not to romanticise it?). This is one reason why these beautiful chonks of redness had such a widespread effect given the hardships of wearing and removing these unusual footwear gimmicks.
The question that comes is whether or not will they stay on the forefront next season? Well soon after their release, the same boots were brought in into newer shades such as black and white, a yellow crocs version of these boots also came into play and all of these boots were taken in by the fashion citizens by much love and positive critique. If i had the money, I know I’d buy pairs of these chonks in every shade no matter if they stay in “trend” or not. Fashion is more than mere “trends”, its your style and your story, its eternal.
The MSCHF Red Boots had double faced reactions with people; some loved it and were in complete awe, while some were appalled with it because “they are literally so impractical, am I supposed to wake up 1 hour in advance to wear them?”, well sometimes to relive your childhood dreams and to go around strutting a pair of statement boots is pain but the pros definitely outweigh the hardships and struggles.
What is fashion if not an ordeal?
"Don't be into trends. Don't make fashion own you, but you decide what you are, what you want to express by the way you dress and the way to live." —Gianni Versace
