An outfit that requires decoding: model Gigi Hadid exiting a shop that sells vapes and lottery tickets–heaven for some people!–while dressed in a Lack of Color X Devon Lee Carlson cowboy hat, workout leggings, and Arizona Love sandals made from recycled plastic bottles. I’m not sure what activities would require a person to wear such a random assortment of items beyond… composting?
This is a rare example of a legitimate model off-duty look, a perhaps welcome alternative to the manicured and metropolitan-cool that articles like this and this and this have attempted to capture. It’s also pure Gigi—the outdoorsy equestrian-turned-supermodel–who rode into Vogue World: Paris on a horse less than a month ago. See also: Bella Hadid. The model’s romance with real-life horseman Adan Bañuelos has precipitated a subtle but significant shift towards urban cowgirl.
It’s Gigi’s footwear that will likely inspire the most division here. (I’d rather eat a kilo of stale granola bars than wear these, and it’s perhaps for that reason that I lack the imagination to see the allure in sensible hiking sandals.) Lots of people will take umbrage with me saying this. “Recent holidays that involved rocky outcrops taught me that I need a sturdy summer shoe that can withstand the sea,” this British Vogue‘s fashion features editor Laura Hawkins contests. “Enter Teva’s original Velcro sandal, which brings people with the hots for gorp- and normcore dressing out in hot flushes.”