Your winter-proof boot guide is here

Fashion’s favourite boots and how to wear them.

“I’m a big fan of boots,” says covergirl Kaia Gerber to VOGUE Video, her eyebrows ticking upwards for emphasis. “I love the word boots. I just love to say I’m wearing boots. It just – it sounds serious. Like, ‘oh my gosh she has boots on’.” The girl with the supermodel DNA is expressing a universal truth: boots are the most exciting cold-weather non-negotiable. Made for walking, they always occupy a prominent spot in the zeitgeist. This winter, there are a plethora of options to reboot your wardrobe aesthetic. Don’t feel obligated to choose just one. 

Don’t call it a combat 

The most influential shoe since Balenciaga’s Tripple S (colloquially, ugly) sneaker is without a doubt the Bottega Veneta combat boot. It set the tone for the thick-sole chunky minimalism that saturates today’s boot mentality and seems to elevate just about any ensemble. The sense of strength and resilience these boots imbue is something you’ll want to wear long after the Bottega trend wave crashes. Enter Simone Rocha and Junya Watanabe’s fall 2021 collections: a reminder that the floral-dress-and-Dr.-Martens grungy aesthetic never died, it just continues to develop.  

Normal appeal

Hedi Slimane’s Celine has become the poster brand for studied normalcy. Or, if you’re feeling French, a bourgeois aesthetic. No surprise then that the Chelsea boot made an appearance just five looks into his fall collection. There it was: a simplistic pair in polished black leather with a modest track sole and a tall ankle-hugging shaft flanked by an unassuming gold buckle. As fun as getting dressed can be, we all have days where our mental capacity for serving a look is at zero. That’s where the reliable brilliance of a simple, bourgeois Chelsea boot is an absolute lifesaver. You don’t have to think twice.

Support the knee 

There’s a reason South Africa’s design darling Thebe Magugu did a knee-high boot as part of his debut footwear collection this season: the shape has a structured elegance that feels perfectly positioned to stomp forth, especially with the ultra-sharp toe that defines his Sunday Best design. It also gives Magugu’s version an edge in a season where the style appeared at Dior, Louis Vuitton, and Hèrmes to name a very few. If it’s a dressed-up practicality you’re after, the simple black knee-high is a perfect pairing with every single dress and skirt (regardless of length) in your wardrobe. 

UGG mentality 

The American designer Telfar Clemens, the creator of the instant-sellout Bushwick Birkin bag, loves an UGG boot. In a press email announcing his collaboration with the brand, he describes them as “really sexy—a soft kind of rugged.” That cool factor, paired with current 00s nostalgia (think Paris Hilton in pink Juicy Couture paired with UGGs and a dog) and a year of lockdown has birthed the most laidback boot styles imaginable. Miu Miu’s Fall 21 snow-chic collection featured fluffy UGG-like things both ankle-grazing and thigh-high. Puffer jacket fans clutched their down stuffing for dear life with excitement at the debut of a magically pouffy (and probably water-resistant) puffer boot. This level of indulgent fun may seem daunting to style, but fear not. We’re in the early days of this boot mood, so there are no rules. Follow your instinct, don’t take it at all seriously, and enjoy the unparalleled comfort. In short, the best way is your way.