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FiveFinger Fashion: Are you a Peacock or a Salamander?

by Christine Skelly » on Apr 25, 2011 3

The title may seem to be a strange question for most bipeds reading these articles looking for advice and rhetoric on shoes made for homo sapiens, but what I mean relates more to the style of VFF you the reader goes for.

wearing all grey on a VFF day

Wore this when it was a bit cloudier outside!

Are you the kind that uses the shoes as a means of peacocking; a conversation starter, a bright statement maybe relating to your personality, or just perhaps an affinity for bright colors, or are you a salamander; buying neutral FiveFingers to serve their purpose and blend in as if it were a black or brown shoe?

Which brings me to my main questions that I would like the readers to give input on: do your shoes affect the rest of your apparel? Do you base your outfit on your VFFs, or base your VFFs on your outfit?

Peacocking it up!

Wore this outfit the other day showing what bright colors can go with your VFFs

Now this may seem like more of a quandary for the female populous, but I sincerely wonder if it influences what VFF wearers will choose to pair with their shoes. I certainly have a pair of peacocking shoes (my green and blue sprints) which are brighter that I wear for comfort and fun, and I have my silver and red KSO Treks that are more for function as my everyday and seem to elicit fewer responses. I even had several peers comment that they thought I was barefoot while I was wearing the silver KSOs on a camping trip. Really? The fact that the neutral color blends bothers me a bit since I am not a fan of the color palette itself, although the grey does go with several of my darker clothes, such as black pants. It should be noted that these were purchased at a time when the KSO Treks were very new and silver was the only color, a mere 8 months ago! But I digress.

I am certainly a peacock and enjoy the wonder sparked from people seeing something new and being able to educate people on the barefoot movement and the benefits going barefoot or almost can provide. But as a peacock I am certainly going to pursue some of Vibram’s brighter models that they have now begun to crank out. I get more excited than is socially acceptable about the models such as the KOMODOSPORT (both the black/gold and blue/yellow), the showy JAYA LRs that have literal racing stripes, and of course, the brighter Bikilas.

So to all of you barefoot bipeds, do you consider color choice when planning your VFF purchase, or even day-to-day wear? Or is it irrelevant since the shoes are a powerful enough statement to be considered a separate entity apart from the trivialities of apparel?

Submitted Comments

  1. Caitlin says:

    I definitely like to be color coordinated! I have the orange/pink Bikilas, and I wear them with jeans and a black, orange or pink top. When I wear dress pants, I pair them with my black TrekSports.

  2. Brian says:

    For me… I guess it depends on my mood. Sometimes I’m in a crappy mood or whatever and I don’t want to be bothered, so I much prefer to blend in. Other times, when I’m in a good mood, I won’t mind the attention from strangers, so I’ll wear a pair that stand out a bit more.

  3. Julia says:

    Definitely a Salamander. I’ve found that the Five Fingers style stands out enough that even wearing black classics I get tons of questions and comments.

    Also, black doesn’t have to match anything so it matches everything. (color clashes are a pet peeve of mine.)

    But hey! In whatever color, they are still the most comfortable foot protection out there!

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