We love shoes. We wear them every day. But not these shoes: Sometimes, footgear that comes into the Wired offices is just too strange for everyday use.
In this video we visit three new shoes whose function beats the holy hell out of form.
From fishing shoes with replaceable soles to sandals with frickin’ flashlights on them to shoes that barely have a sole at all, we make a lighthearted visit to the weird world of highly alternative foot covering.
Here’s a little more information on each of these shoes.
The first wading boot with interchangeable soles, the Korkers Guide is designed to adapt to almost any fishing situation. Wading on slimy riverbed? The felt soles will keep you from slipping. Long hike between honey pots? The lugged soles get a grip on dry land just like a hiking boot. And with Boa’s stainless steel lacing system replacing the standard cat’s cradle of nylon string, these boots are the easiest we’ve ever put on. The only drawback — and it’s a pretty big one — is that the soles are seriously tricky to swap out. You need a special lever-type key to set the new bottoms into the boot — a key which we lost before we even hit the water. Good thing we had a flat-head screwdriver in the trunk: It did the job OK. $180, korkers.com
The Teva Illum takes almost the opposite approach to outdoor fun: stripped-down and minimal. A standard flip-flop in design, the Illum adds a small LED light, mounted on top of the strap, to help illuminate your path in the darkness. Teva touts this as an aid to surfers on dawn patrol, but we think it would work pretty well for dog owners on poop patrol, too. $60, teva.com
The Terra Plana EVO is the latest installment in the company’s line of nearly-barefoot shoes. Like the company’s Vivo Barefoot, the EVO has a flexible, minimal sole designed to protect your feet while encouraging a more natural, barefoot-like gait. The EVO is a comfortable, if slightly odd-looking shoe, and it does work well for barefoot-like running, in our tests — it’s much like a running flat. It’s also much less unusual-looking than the Vibram FiveFingers, a glove-like foot covering with individual pockets for each toe. If you want a flexible sole but don’t want to call attention to yourself, the EVO is a good bet. $160, www.terraplana.com/the-evo
Note: We’ve examined the science of barefoot running before, and found mixed evidence for the claim that running barefoot — or nearly so — is actually better for your body than wearing the kind of running shoes that have big, cushioned, wedge-like heels. That’s because, with a shoe like this, you’ve got to land more on the front or middle of your foot, instead of pounding your heel down. But be careful: Most people’s feet and legs aren’t accustomed to running this way, so build up very, very slowly or you’ll run the risk of injuring yourself, as Wired.com senior editor Dylan Tweney did. Start slow, with quarter-mile runs at most, and build up very, very gradually.
Written by Joe Brown and Dylan Tweney; video produced by Annaliza Savage, with camera work and editing by Michael Lennon and Fernando Cardoso. Guest appearance by former Wired.com science editor Kristen Philipkoski.
Until we reach the time when tattoos make checking blood glucose levels cool, we’re going to need another way to keep kids with diabetes healthy. And hey, kids love videogames, right? Bayer’s Didget is based on the company’s Contour glucose meter, but instead of connecting by USB it’s shaped like a Game Boy cartridge, enabling it to slot into a Nintendo DS or DS Lite. When kids upload their scores to a custom game (the less than thrilling sounding Knock ‘Em Downs: World Fair) they’ll unlock new characters and items, but there’s one fatal flaw in this plan: the system necessarily isn’t compatible with the DSi (or its XL brother) and we’re guessing the big cartridge slot isn’t due for a comeback in the 3DS. In other words, this meter is on a fast-track to obsolescence.
