The jelly shoes of the ‘90s are back, but with a sustainable twist.
Footwear company Melissa has teamed up with Paris-based “hardcore vegan” brand Rombaut to launch a fully vegan collection of jelly shoes.
The Melissa x Rombaut collection features two styles that have been reinvented in vegan jelly form. The first is Melissa’s iconic close-toed Possession sandal, and the second is Rombaut’s Boccaccio sneaker. Each pair is made out of 50% recycled PVC sourced from factory waste and 30% bio-based renewable carbon content (this includes soy-based oils, plant-based oils like canola oil, and sugarcane).
Other natural materials that make up the shoes include sugarcane used for the insole, laces created out of recycled plastic water bottles, and rice husks injected into the shoes for the aesthetic, acting as a substitute for glitter.
Further, the two brands chose to take advantage of Melissa’s established recycling initiatives. To close the loop and make the collection as circular as possible, customers are encouraged to discard their worn out Melissa x Rombaut shoes at designated drop off points in any one of Melissa’s stores.
The shoes that are dropped off will be melted down and remodeled into different kinds of footwear. In fact, Rombaut says that 50% of shoes in the Melissa x Rombaut collection are made out of upcycled PVC shoes that were previously collected from Melissa drop off points.
The Boccaccio sneaker is available in mint green, black, white, grey, and a transparent, glittery ochre, while the Possession sandals come in lavender, black, bright green, and transparent ochre. According to Melissa, each pair of shoes was designed to look like it was melting, as a nod to climate change and global warming. In addition, each shoe has the words “Melting Soon” engraved onto the front.
All images in this article are courtesy of Melissa and Rombaut.
