Ballet Flats Are the Ultimate Transitional Shoe – Here Are the Best Pairs to Buy Now

“There’s a comfort, versatility and femininity [to the ballet flat] that feels familiar yet evolving,” says Jane Frances, founder and creative director of Dear Frances. The British brand’s Balla Mesh flats shot to popularity in 2021, when the form-fitting silhouette and use of sheer fabrications were still a new (and perhaps polarising) idea. “The glove fit is central to my design ethos,” Frances explains. “My focus is on exposing the female form through silhouettes that are not traditionally feminine. Balla was designed to expose the skin. It evolved from my dedication to designing an understated dressy flat, offering that grounding feeling of being dressed up while still feeling like yourself.” Now, the glove fit is a shoe trend that maintains its popularity beyond the ballet flat – Dear Frances’ Balla range has expanded to include boots and loafers with the same supple, dance-inspired construction. And as the brand celebrates its 10th anniversary, the same core inspirations remain. “It’s all about the unexpected contrast between strong and soft, a delicate strength,” says Frances.

When Beatriz de los Mozos’ doctor told her that her flat-soled Venetian shoes were exacerbating her back problems, the seed of a thought was planted. What if she created a new shoe that fused her beloved flat friulane with espadrilles, offering the same style but with more cushioning and structure? Soon, Flabelus was born. Several years later, the Spanish brand has single-handedly sparked a trend, with its colourful velvet Mary Janes (and subsequent replicas) suddenly seen everywhere. “For a long time, fashion almost asked women to choose between being feminine and being modern,” says De los Mozos. “But now those ideas can coexist much more freely – a Mary Jane can feel innocent, rebellious, intellectual, romantic or incredibly sophisticated depending on how you style it. I think that versatility – combined with the return to more playful, unapologetically feminine dressing – explains why people are responding to it so strongly again.”

Le Monde Béryl’s glove-like Luna flats were dubbed the “most stylish shoe of the summer” by tastemaker and writer Otegha Uwagba for New York Magazine’s The Strategist, but it’s the London brand’s buckle-fastened Mary Janes that you’ll likely recognise – they’ve been seen on the likes of Kaia Gerber, Sofia Richie Grainge and Alexa Chung. “It can be easy to think of ballet flats as saccharine, but we’ve always imagined them with a lot of attitude,” say co-founders Lily Atherton Hanbury and Katya Shyfrin. “Our Claudia flats, for example, have buckles that give them a kind of boyish toughness.” It’s this tension between feminine and functional that makes ballet flats such an appealing choice right now, although the duo see the style as less of a trend than an all-time classic. “The ballet flat is a thing of beauty and simplicity. Its momentum as a fashion trend might ebb and flow, but as a visual idea so connected with [ballet], one of the greatest mediums in the arts, it’s incomparable.”