Velvet Stars

Miley’s doing Converse again—third collaboration—and I was ready to ignore it. Most celebrity shoes are just a name on standard inventory. But there’s this vinyl Chuck Taylor with star tape on the sole, that kind of small ridiculous detail that either lands or it doesn’t. These land.

The platform versions in brushed velvet with scattered glitter are the real move. Velvet on a sneaker could be a total disaster, but they kept it restrained—glitter threaded through instead of plastered everywhere, colors like burgundy and electric blue that don’t pretend to be wearable. It takes real confidence to put a texture like that on something people are supposed to walk in, and it shows someone actually thought about what they were making instead of just licensing a name.

The whole thing coheres around her existing taste, which is at least honest. Matching clothes, same palette, same maximalist energy she already does. It feels like one idea instead of a cash-grab with someone’s face on it.

I’m skeptical of these things by instinct—celebrity collaborations are there to sell a person, not shoes. But sometimes the design is competent enough that you stop thinking about that. The velvet pieces here actually are. The vinyl stuff is just fun noise, which is fine too.