Some shoes we simply wear. Others, we debate endlessly.
New Balance’s mutant 1906L is clearly in the latter category. Introduced last year, New Balance’s shoe is a mash-up of a sneaker and a loafer, christened the “Snoafer” by the internet. It’s a mutt-like design caught in the liminal space between informal and formal.
Whatever else the Snoafer may be, it has been polarizing. Versions of the shoes keep selling out (though how many have been produced is unclear), yet detractors say that the Snoafer is just plain ugly.
In an edited conversation, Jon Caramanica, Stella Bugbee and Jacob Gallagher, three members of The New York Times staff (two of whom actually purchased the Snoafers) discuss the shoe’s Frankensteinian merits, how it has been received by their respective family members and if it’s actually ugly enough.
STELLA BUGBEE There’s something profoundly perverse about these shoes.
JACOB GALLAGHER I could see someone saying that they don’t go together in an orange juice and toothpaste sort of way, but perverse? Say more.
BUGBEE They don’t know what they want to be, and yet they are unapologetically themselves. That tension produces an uncomfortable feeling in me — in a good way, I think.
