‘Like a horse hoof’: the most controversial shoe of the 2010s is back

Few shoes have invited the kind of rage that 2010s fashion writers reserved for the Lita by Jeffrey Campbell. The chunky ankle platform boot, a recession-core relic once seen on it girls like Lindsay Lohan, Demi Lovato and Vanessa Hudgens, was called “ the Clydesdale hoof of modern footwear ” and “ the ugliest shoe in our closet ”.

I disagree. As someone who straddles the millennial/gen Z line, I came of age on Nasty Gal dot com. Back then, Nasty Gal sold what would become indelible symbols of the era: skinny jeans, ballet flats, flower crowns, moustache-printed sweaters, and the like. (This was before the e-retailer’s founder, Sophia Amoruso, published her self-help book #Girlboss, the paragon of hyper-capitalist, lean in-style feminism.)

Nasty Gal was where I first met the Lita boots. I wanted them badly, but the $160 price tag was out of reach for a teenager. Even if I’d had the cash, I wouldn’t have been able to settle on a style. According to the Daily Beast, by 2013 – the year I graduated high school – Jeffrey Campbell had sold 160,000 pairs of Lita boots in 164 colors. Countless bloggers (we didn’t call them influencers yet) posted street style shots in every variety: chartreuse, amethyst purple, American flag-printed, cat-printed. The Cold Feet line, intended for brides, even saw Litas decked out in lace and blue velvet.

But in 2013, Fashionista wrote that brides who wore Cold Feet on their big day were guaranteed to have “wedding photos will look totally outdated in, like, a month”. The thickset platform boot – with its 5.25-inch heel – had become a victim of its own trendiness.

“You either loved them or hated them,” Erin Miller, a 35-year-old content creator who lives in Iowa and posts on TikTok about millennial history, told me. She first saw the Lita boots on Tumblr around 2011. “To me, they were edgy and the epitome of fashion . All I wanted was a skull scarf and studded Lita boots. When Lindsay Lohan wore the pair to Coachella, I thought it didn’t get any cooler than that.”

Mark Hunter, the photographer known as Cobrasnake, chronicled the 2010s party scenes in New York and Los Angeles. (More recently, he snapped pics at Charli xcx’s birthday.) He has a soft place in his heart for the Litas, which he says were “everywhere” during his heyday, seen at “underground parties and fashion events on all the coolest girls”.

“Is the Lita ugly ? Maybe to some, but ‘ugly’ is art, and art is subjective,” Hunter said. “As a guy, I always just thought they looked uncomfortable, like a horse hoof. In retrospect, I think the Lita represented the DIY spirit of the era, where fashion wasn’t about fitting in; it was about standing out.”

Unfortunately, by the time I moved to New York for college, the cool kids no longer wore Litas. They’d become another decidedly millennial period piece, ageing as poorly as a Terry Richardson magazine spread or the chorus of Robin Thicke’s Blurred Lines.

But gen Z, yearning for a simpler time when artists could still afford to live in places like Berlin or Brooklyn, have embraced what is now known as the indie sleaze era. They’re rewatching HBO’s Girls, ditching their iPhones in favor of Nokia flips, and posting messy party shots on Instagram. Indie sleaze has hit the fashion world too, with the return of trucker hats, low-rise waistlines and hair bows.

So it was only a matter of time before Jeffrey Campbell brought back the Lita boot, which officially hit online shelves again this summer. “Tumblr summer is so back,” reads the caption for a TikTok post by the brand that features a montage of boot styles soundtracked by the millennial party anthem Like a G6.

“I FINALLY HAVE ADULT MONEY TO BUY THEM,” reads one comment. “Ive been waiting for this moment so i can heal my inner child who couldn’t afford them,” wrote another.

A representative for Jeffrey Campbell wrote in an email that the team “decided to bring back our iconic Lita’s and other styles from the early 2010s for our latest collection because we saw the resurgence of these trends on the horizon … Rejecting modernity and embracing Jeffrey Campbell indie sleaze.”

According to the rep, the brand has sold about 430 pairs of Litas since the relaunch. I tried out a black leather version with spike detailing on the heel and platform, whose shoebox came with a warning: watch out for the barbs. Because I couldn’t use my hands to help guide my feet for fear of being stabbed, I almost toppled over while balancing on one leg to shimmy the other into a boot.

Still, and despite all photographic evidence to the contrary, I learned that once you get the Litas on, you are comfortable. The 2.5in platform helps make the 5in heel feel less dramatic, and I easily walked 30 or so minutes to the bar where I planned to meet my friends without wobbling too much.

At the bar, two girls taking photos with the kind of point-and-shoot digital camera I remember my mom using on family vacations fawned over the boots. When I told them I was in high school during the Litas heyday, one asked: “What was it like to be alive then?” (I didn’t know how to tell them that what I remember most is thinking something was wrong with me because I did not look good with Zooey Deschanel-style bangs, and men having a tenuous-at-best understanding of consent.)

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I fielded compliments all night. A kindergarten teacher celebrating the last gasps of summer break asked to try them on. An ambient DJ said his girlfriend had an old pair in the back of their closet. A girl wearing a boot cast said she wanted to get a pair after her foot healed, though we agreed they might land her back in an orthopedic brace. Haters be damned, the Litas were bringing people together.

It wasn’t until I got home late that night and took off the boots that I revealed two blisters on each of my ankles – the price to be paid for all the fun I had in them.

I planned to wear the Lita boots a week or so later, and they looked good with the all-black outfit I’d picked out. But after taking one step outside my apartment, I decided to go back inside and put on sneakers. The height was nice, but I’m getting older, and I long to feel sturdy on the ground.

Jeffrey Campbell provided the black leather Litas with spike detailing on the heel and platform, retailing at $240, for review