The pandemic has turned everyday style on its head. As the UK hunkered down at home and left only for daily exercise and food shops during lockdown, sales of tracksuits rocketed, while handbags and formal clothes waned at the back of wardrobes. Practical items took precedence over pretty and even the much maligned Croc seems to have had a renaissance.
Between April and May – around the time that most of people settled into the idea of swapping pubs for planting vegetables and baking banana bread – sales of Crocs rose by a third on the global fashion search platform, Lyst.
The shopping platform goes as far as calling Crocs “the ‘It’ shoe of spring” and says demand remains strong into autumn. A fact that means the surprise fashion hit of lockdown may be making its way beyond the garden gate as lockdown eases, and into the new normal of socialising.
Indeed, they were on the feet of several show-goers photographed at Copenhagen Fashion Week – one of the first offline events attended by the fashion crowd since the pandemic became global. Plus, Chinese actress Zhou Yutong recently wore black platform Crocs on the red carpet in Shanghai.