Recently I was meeting a friend for breakfast at a private members club. I was dressed in black pants, a silk jacket and white leather lace-up shoes with rubber soles — and was barred from the dining room because the guard said they were sneakers. I said the shoes were leather, but it didn’t work. So here’s what I want to know: What’s the difference between a sneaker and a shoe these days? — Elaine, Paris
Wow. I could write a whole treatise on this subject but will try to be brief.
Officially a sneaker is “a sports shoe with a pliable rubber sole,” at least according to the Merriam-Webster dictionary. That signifies a shoe meant to be worn while playing sports or otherwise engaging in athletic activity. For decades that made for a pretty straightforward distinction between sneakers and other shoes, especially leather lace-ups or loafers meant for wearing to work and more formal social occasions.
And it made dress codes easy. If an institution wanted to signal that it was serious or aspirational, it would create a dress code that drew a line between sneakers and shoes. It was considered a sign of respect to wear more polished attire. Ergo the dress code you encountered.
But that all changed in the 1990s, said Michael Mack, a professor of accessory design at the Savannah College of Art and Design who specializes in sneakers. At that time, Nike acknowledged that its footwear wasn’t just about performance but culture, and sneakers evolved from being just about sports to being about identity.
From there it was just a hop, skip and a jump until fashion got hold of them and started introducing shoes that may have been sneakers in name but actually looked more like sculptures. Then Covid happened, and everyone became used to wearing soft-soled shoes that didn’t constrict the foot. There was no going back.
Now there are dress sneakers, as modeled by the House minority leader, Hakeem Jeffries, and fashion sneakers, both of which often come with the explicit disclaimer that they should not be used for performance activities. But while there has been a clear evolution in sneaker style and sneaker etymology — and attitudes among generations about what is acceptable dress — there has not been a related evolution in many official dress codes.
When I called a classic private club in New York to ask about its approach, a spokesman told me he spent hours in the Bergdorf Goodman shoe department taking pictures of Ferragamo loafers with rubber soles, trying to clarify the distinctions.
“The problem is one of linguistics,” Mr. Mack said. He thinks there should be a new subcategory created for dress sneakers. After all, in clubs, it is often the person at the door or guard who is asked to adjudicate what is acceptable and what is not, and this can lead to some jury-rigged distinctions — which is what you ran up against.
At this point, it seems as if most clubs would allow the sort of shoe Mr. Jeffries wore: a dark leather upper with matching laces and a white rubber sole. A white leather upper looks too much like a tennis shoe, which suggests it is actually used for sports, which is the problem.
The obvious solution is for an institution to change its dress code to allow for sneakers, thus keeping it in line with contemporary mores, and maybe just forbid flip-flops. This is, in fact, the policy at many hip new private clubs that have popped up around the world.
But, as Edward Reilly, the chair of the house committee of the University Club in New York, which has a no-sneakers policy, said such a change “would result in a long, soul-searching experience.” And that may be more than most members are ready for. Sometimes a shoe is only a shoe, and sometimes it is a vessel for social and sartorial evolution.
Your Style Questions, Answered
Every week on Open Thread, Vanessa will answer a reader’s fashion-related question, which you can send to her anytime via email or X. Questions are edited and condensed.
Vanessa Friedman has been the fashion director and chief fashion critic for The Times since 2014.
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