Now 'odd' even cool

Mismatched shoes are suddenly a fashion statement, not the sleepy accident of the absent-minded.

Let us start by pointing out that the correct fashion term for this trend is "mismatched shoes", not odd ones. Wearing "odd shoes", apparently, implies that when you put those two, non-identical brogues on your feet this morning, it was an accident.

The fashion statements made by the street style set at Paris fashion week in February and on social media right now, are entirely deliberate.

It all started on the catwalk at Celine in September, when the instigator of all things cool and off-kilter, Phoebe Philo, sent models wearing odd boots - one black with one brown, one tan with one lemon - down her catwalk. It was simultaneously bold and subtle, the kind of considered styling trick that Philo's fans go wild for.

Like many of her recent fashion impacts (making trainers chic again, paint brush prints, et al) it is one that is easy to copy en masse.

As such, the street stylers have adopted it in real life outside the shows this season. Brooklyn Beckham has been giving it a go in his teenage high-tops and even White House press secretary Sean Spicer was photographed shod in black on one foot and brown on the other. (The photo went viral, but it wasn't quite the way it looked: He wore a brown shoe on one foot. On the other, he donned a dark blue-striped sock with a foot brace, the kind of boot-like contraption you'd wear if you hurt your foot.)

Some of the style cognoscenti have nodded to intentional mismatching in a more subtle way, by simply switching their laces or ribbons, but others have gone the full Philo, wearing completely contrasting footwear. So is it really as daft as it sounds?

"Yes they do feel odd, but in a good way," says Erica Davies, a fashion editor and founder of style blog The Edited, who has been trialing the trend since last summer. "I think anything can go, so long as it's tonal. Prints, patterns, colors; it all works together as long as the tones work."

The easiest way to do it seems to be to buy two pairs of the same style in slightly different colors or fabrications. No one is hobbling around with a stiletto on the left foot and a smoking slipper on the right.

"I think fashion should be fun, but I also don't want to look ridiculous," says Davies. "I love the fact that my mismatched sandals are all in the same colorway. I love wearing them with simple black or white, to make them the focus."

Davies has more than 43,000 followers on Instagram, some of whom reacted by stating that they were "too OCD" to try it for themselves, but most just wanted to know where she bought them. Her go-to odd sandals are by Natalie Alamein, an Australian designer who founded her eponymous line in 2013. Alamein tells us that she loves to watch customers' reactions when they first see her mismatched pairs on display at her Bondi Beach flagship store.

"I have had every reaction possible from customers - everyone has an opinion," she says. "There was one Russian model who thought I was lying and trying to sell her two different shoes, then there have been some who don't understand the concept and keep asking to buy the matching pair."

"People are instantly drawn to the beauty of these shoes, however it is not until they put them on, look left and look right that they appreciate the harmony mismatched shoes can create."

Alamein describes the "thrill of wearing something that goes against the grain" as being the key motivator for the women who buy them, noting that they naturally challenge our ideas about what is acceptable.

Prices for Alamein's sandals are around 110 (136.35), while Celine's styles are decidedly more expensive, starting at around 540 (669.04) and being sold only in their matching pairs.

Which means that to get the catwalk look you'll need to buy two sets? Ah.

Daily Telegraph