Spotting Salomon shoes on Australian streets is just about the easiest trend-watching game around: once you start looking, you’ll see them everywhere. Over the past five years the hyped outdoor-sport-and-sneaker-hybrid brand became prevalent gradually, then suddenly.

The shoes have a particular hold on Melbourne’s inner north, Sydney’s inner west and other grungy-but-gentrified areas of the country. You can spot them on bike pedals, pavements outside natural wine bars and in the elevators of slick co-working spaces – not exactly the rugged terrain they’re designed for. “You can hike in these? These are my best dress shoes,” content creators Kick It Forward quipped in a recent video mocking Melbourne fashion.

So how did we get here?

Hiking outerwear as a style choice started agglomerating on US streets around 2017, a trend dubbed gorpcore. Then came the reclaiming of the ugly “dad sneaker” by Balenciaga and other high-end labels circa 2018, which helped dispel the stigma attached to chunky, bulbous shoes. And last year, stylist Allison Bornstein outlined the wrong-shoe theory, which suggests the best way to finish an outfit is with the most unexpected shoe possible.

All this has worked in favour of Salomon, a sportswear company founded in the French Alps in 1947. It launched its first hiking boot in ’92, and its first XA adventure shoe in ’01. But recent collaborations with the likes of Sandy Liang and MM6 Maison Margiela have rocketed the brand to enviable, buzzy status and put its daggy image to rest.

“It was perceived as the brand of your dad, [it was known as the] old-school leather hiking boot, quite plain in execution,” Peter Kouppas, Salomon’s omnichannel brand manager, tells Broadsheet. “The brand’s done a lot of work to ensure the product is positioned correctly.”

“I first noticed Salomon entering the fashion sphere back in 2015 when I was browsing designer boutiques like The Broken Arm in Paris and Storm in Copenhagen, where the garish red Snow Crosses – usually marketed as high-performance snow running shoes – were being paired with very winter-unfriendly pieces like summer skirts and pants,” says Tri Nguyen, Broadsheet’s senior creative solutions manager.

In addition to the aforementioned collabs with Sandy Liang and MM6, he points to Salomon’s canny alignment with the techno scene as evidence for its mainstream rise. “It’s worked with electronic music festivals like Amsterdam’s Dekmantel, to develop the ultimate shoe for dancers,” he says. “This follows years of Salomon being the raver’s shoes of choice, not only for their style but also for their ability to withstand any terrain and weather condition – or at least, hundreds of people accidentally stepping on your toes.”

Though Salomon has been distributed here for a decade, this recent surge in popularity led to the brand opening its first Australian store this month, inside Melbourne’s Chadstone Shopping Centre. The launch party was a sought-after event, with stylists, content creators and other fashion industry folk (rather than sportspeople, Salomon’s original ambassadors) making up the night’s guest list. Broadsheet editor Gitika Garg was among them. “Some people leaned into the traditional athleisure look with spray pants and baggy jeans,” she says. “But others paired their Salomons with frilly and preppy dresses, delicate designer bags, Y2K belts and other accessories.”

The cacophony of style reflects Salomon’s wide demographic. Among its brand representatives are Olympic athletes and award-winning adventurers, as well as musicians, artists and Kate Reid, the founder of Lune Croissanterie.

Sydney-based stylist Marisa Suen puts Australian customers into two camps: “People who are wearing Salomon shoes for function [and] anything outdoor-sports related” and those “who are wearing them because they trended”. Her past-tense assertion that these shoes have trended is unequivocal. “[I] famously hate them. They need to stay in 2019,” she says. “And not because I stepped in human shit in my previously owned S/LAB XT-6 outside a club in New York and had to scrape it out of the ridges … with my nails, in the club bathroom.”

As an alternative to Salomon she recommends La Sportiva, which has the “same vibe, minus losing aura points”. And if you’re in the market for ugly outdoor footwear, she swears by her Vibram FiveFingers shoes (yes, they look just like you’re picturing).

Broadsheet’s shopping editor Simone Richardson also thinks it’s time to move on from Salomon. “Is a mass of anything good? It kills cool shit,” she says. “I had a pair of XT-6s in 2018 and sold them on Depop in 2019 for the same price I bought them. Fronting no loss (despite wear and tear) goes to show the momentum of the trend at that time – and now, four years later, it’s hit the masses.

“Don’t get me wrong, if you’re heading outdoors, the label’s hiking and trail running footwear is legit. But if you’re spending upwards of $300 on the brand’s Sportstyle releases, it’s unlikely you’re scuffing them in the bush.”

But perhaps all this talk of trends and aesthetics is missing the point.

Broadsheet Sydney photographer Declan Blackall, a self-proclaimed “stan” of the brand, began wearing Salomons on his hikes. But it wasn’t long before his shoes moved from being outdoor-gear exclusive to a firm fixture in his daily wardrobe. The modern styles, specifically the XT line (designed for trail running) are now his shoe of choice.

“Because of my job as a photographer, I needed something that was durable, lightweight and that I could wear for long days on my feet,” he says. “I wear them most often with any relaxed-fit pants and a T-shirt, but [I] also like that I can get away with wearing them out to a dinner or an event with dressier looks as well.”

Blackall wears his Salomons so much, there’s a self-designated pecking order in his collection: “I have a succession of identical Salomons that start as a going-out pair until they’re relegated to becoming a work pair,” he says. “Or, god forbid, returned to the outdoors as a hiking pair.”