In Italy they have been around for centuries, this summer they will be discovered by the whole world: Friulane are espadrilles for people who don’t like moccasins. Or something like that.
For her: slipper porn
Even if everyone thinks that Greece is the new Italy: Good style still comes from the country where you drink an espresso from cups at the bar and wear nice shoes underneath. But of course you don’t notice that on the Greek beaches, sipping cold coffee with a straw from huge plastic cups (officially banned since 2021). Which is why we are belatedly proclaiming the ultimate summer shoe: Friulane. Kate Moss wears them, and so does Hollywood’s best-dressed woman, Katie Holmes, even in winter. Friulians have long been hyped for Italian feet, but they are actually very old: In the 19th century, women in Friuli began to cobble shoes out of old bicycle tires and theater curtains. What the people in Venice thought was very chic, which is why the loafer quickly became their symbol. The simple slippers don’t cost much, but because of the velvet they give them the sludgy grandeur that is the quintessence of Italian style: I don’t care what I wear, they say – although, charmingly, exactly the opposite is the case. This version here is a collaboration between Vibi Venezia and British designer Emilia Wickstead. They don’t really go with anything, but they somehow go with everything, as long as everything is beautiful: with trousers, shorts and dresses. They just don’t go with gigantic plastic cups, but that doesn’t matter, on Mykonos people prefer to wear slides from trashy luxury conglomerate labels anyway.
For him: romantic, practical, good
If you read about the history of the northern Italian velvet slippers, one historical image sticks in your mind: the tradition that young aristocrats liked to use the light slippers when they walked in their gardens and palazzi because the shoes felt so noiseless and velvety. Yeah, Don Juan in the arched window! Anyone who still feels an inclination to recite poetry and orange blossoms, i.e. wants to be a modern man, also needs Furlane or Friulane in summer. And preferably a pair from Papusse Milano, where the things are still made on site and by hand. You immediately become a romantic beta version of yourself. The gait becomes softer, you no longer walk but stroll, you get a mild look and become the opposite of a stiff Englishman with nailed shoes. In Milan, consummate beauties like Guglielmo Miani wear furlane slippers as a matter of course with a double-breasted suit. Of course, they also look good with moderately rocked jeans: the little opulence of the shimmering shoe, a tanned ankle and a piece of dignified denim – that tingles like a spumante on some evenings. It is important that you wear them confidently and in colour, otherwise the ignorant could get the idea that grandma’s slippers were stolen. By the way, measured by their cultivated effect and the handwork, the slippers are quite cheap at 100 euros, but to be honest you have to say: Sneaker socks or similar devil stuff are of course forbidden in them. So you need new ones after a summer. But the old ones can be applied in the country palace, for example.