A sneaker feeling brought on by age
Past a certain age, despite your willingness to suffer for fashion, your body just gives up. All those years of abuse from tight trousers, shrunken shirts and jackets, and slim and pointy shoes bite yours truly rather painfully in the ass.
I have had this epiphany lately. My body is no longer willing to squeeze itself in to my very tapered trousers and slim shirts. My feet, after swearing off trainers for years and years, refuse to walk in anything but. I always said runners are for children and thieves, so imagine my surprise when I found myself making a beeline to Hogan to buy a pair of trainers a day after I moved back to Hong Kong. I guess age does eventually take its toll.
That said, trainers are officially cool for spring. With sportswear being such a strong trend this season, they have become the new Holy Grail of men's fashion. But take note, those chunky pairs you wear at the gym will not make the grade. Those belong on the treadmill, not in the fashion lane.
Hogan makes good trainers. I especially like its classic Olympia styles because they are not too rugged or sporty. I like that they can be dressed up or down because they are not bulky and come in all sorts of fluorescent colours. My own pair is white with a blue and silver trim. I have worn them with everything, from jeans, a T-shirt and beat-up leather jacket to a striped shawl-collared knit with chinos for a Martha's Vineyard look.
If you're not used to wearing trainers but want to get in on the action, ease yourself into the trend gently. Think of yourself as a cigarette junkie wanting to quit. You don't just wake up one day and stop smoking altogether. You go through the process of smoking less each day until it is completely out of your system, otherwise you'll never get rid of the habit.
Find a pair of trainers with a similar design to dress shoes: sleek, a little slim and if you aren't comfortable wearing white shoes, pick a pair in black. Zegna Sport has a black pair in traditional dress shoe materials such as leather and suede. These look as good with black trousers as they do with jeans. Tod's has a beautiful pair in a high gloss black finish. Prada has perforated leather sneakers (1) in black and in grey, which reminds me of the perforated formal leather lace-ups two summers ago.