That sensation of stepping barefoot in moist sand regularly comes with quite a lot of emotions. However at OluKai, they’ve taken that sensation and made it the spine of sneakers advent, constructing sandals and a variety of closed-toe kinds from a “wet-sand idea.” 

“You could have a look at a three-point sandal as a easy piece of sneakers, however OluKai has taken a easy piece of sneakers and taken true craftsmanship and true footwear-building houses to it to make it a crafted product,” says Blaine Conrad, OluKai vice chairman of product. “We’re constructing it correctly and telling deep tales, making it true and significant.” 

OluKai hasn’t stopped at sandals. Whilst identified, particularly in Hawaii and at strong point surf retail outlets across the world, for its combine of fellows’s and girls’s sandals that it has created since 2006, the emblem that embraces all issues Hawaii — OluKai method “relaxed ocean” in Hawaiian — has expanded into slippers, shoes and now a mix of sneakers kinds, together with new chukka-style boots to be had this autumn. 

“We’re getting extra other people to understand our logo and so they come to our logo via our hottest kinds,” Conrad says. “We’ve this nice base of product and we’re extending out in spaces like slippers and an expanded sneaker vary with extra fresh designs.” 

As OluKai continues to develop, it keeps its recognition in out of doors strong point retail outlets and embraces its core trade in Hawaii and the coastal spaces of California, Florida and the southeast. However OluKai has noticed fresh expansion from New England to Texas to the Midwest. “

Right through the development, OluKai continues to include all issues Hawaiian tradition. “Once we create new product, we at all times get started with our ocean way of life positioning and the ones attributes,” says Juliana Sanfelici, senior ladies’s sneakers fashion designer. All OluKai product comprises a barefoot sensibility to really feel seamless and comfortable towards a foot, particularly when worn with out socks. The sea way of life design contains an easy-on, easy-off development that has maximum closed-toe and slipper merchandise that includes a drop-in heel design that permits the heel to fold down and be stepped on, as is not unusual in Hawaiian tradition. This permits a conventional closed-toe genre to be worn corresponding to a slipper or sandal. 

At this level, OluKai gross sales have developed to 50 p.c sandal and 50 p.c closed-toe, recently rising the closed-toe trade merely as a result of new alternatives. 

“We began with sandals and that’s our first-born product and the place we discovered so much about what we name the wet-sand idea,” Sanfelici says. “It began from a sandal and bringing the feeling of strolling in company, moist sand at the seaside. We need to carry that to all our closed-toe sneakers as smartly.” 

This barefoot sensibility that OluKai talks about is the concept that they decrease seams at the within and use comfortable fabrics that toughen breathability. The underfoot contours of the goods mimic moist sand through offering a contour that includes cushioning, but supportive underneath the arch whilst cupping the heel relatively for balance and toughen. Rainy sand additionally lets in feet to play out in a herbal way.

The most well liked OluKai product in each males’s and girls’s is the Ohana sandal. Ohana method circle of relatives in Hawaiian and the development is without doubt one of the most simple the emblem has. Whilst the Ohana leads the Makai section of the emblem, that means water-facing, the mountain-facing line, Mauka, options the ever-popular Mea Ola sandal made with full-grain leather-based, straps manufactured from leather-based and a footbed wrapped in leather-based. 

“Ocean convenience is on the core of the whole lot we do,” Sanfelici says. “After the relaxation is the sea way of life and the sensibility that individuals truly relate to as a result of they may be able to chill out with top rate, very laid-back aesthetics, which might be refined on the identical time.” 

OluKai strives to carry the “Aloha spirit” and a way of Hawaii to each and every product, whether or not if somebody slides on a couple of sandals in California, shoes in New York Town or chukkas in Kansas Town. That’s why the OluKai designs infuse such a lot Hawaiian really feel. 

Take the Mea Ola as an example, the preferred leather-based sandal. Hand-stitching over the strap is a Hawaiian custom and mimics canoe advent, whilst the graphic at the footbed of an octopus comes from Polynesian tradition. “As you begin to glance nearer, you’ll be able to be told in regards to the legends of Hawaiian tradition and the ones surrounding that animal,” Sanfelici says. “The ones hand stitches are encouraged through the stitches maintaining a canoe in combination. There’s a first degree that provides you with an concept and there’s at all times extra digging to be carried out. We attempt to infuse all of our sneakers with some hidden main points that you’ll be able to uncover as you glance nearer.” Different sandals come with coloring encouraged from conventional canoes, cultural tiki paintings or designs paying homage to in style browsing communities.

Product advent comes each from marketplace call for and Hawaiian-inspired wishes. Every now and then, Sanfelici says, OluKai designers see a marketplace alternative and create product stuffed with Hawaiian inspiration to make it distinctive to OluKai. Different occasions, whilst in Hawaii, they see alternatives to create sneakers best for a particular job.

The most well liked closed-toe variations come with the lads’s Nohea Moku, a textile Makai — towards the water — genre that embraces the theory of barefoot convenience. The Pehuea, the preferred closed-toe providing for girls, is a slip-on breathable textile that embraces the easy-on, easy-off put on. Each have the drop-in, collapsed heel. Closed-toe OluKai product comes with a detachable sockliner.

Because the closed-toe strains continues to develop in each scope and recognition, OluKai has expanded on its sneaker and way of life choices, together with a line of slippers with a drop-in heel with shearling, full-grain leather-based, hand-stitching and rubber outsoles to permit the product to head out of doors. 

Sanfelici says Hawaii has one of these wealthy tradition and lovely those that she loves honoring them with product that tells their tale. “The entirety we do is to have fun Hawaiian tradition, to toughen projects at the island,” she says, alluding to the lengthy historical past of OluKai investment charitable efforts at the island that toughen each other people and standard customs. 

The autumn 2019 assortment now options the Hawai’iloa Assortment encouraged through a canoe in-built Hawaii the use of conventional Polynesian strategies. “We would have liked to honor that canoe,” Sanfelici says, “this can be a very wealthy tale.” The brand new assortment features a boot and sandal for women and men infused with main points and capability encouraged through that canoe, from sew patterns to rope accents. The chukka boot nonetheless embraces the easy-on, easy-off and the ladies’s model, very similar to a Chelsea genre with wool lining, {couples} with the lads’s with a wool-lining and water-repellent elastic laces, mixing the comfy ocean really feel of OluKai with fall styling. 

OluKai needs to carry the wet-sand idea and the Aloha spirit to each and every product, whether or not fall-styled chukkas or signature sandals, resulting in the ever-growing succeed in of Hawaii-inspired OluKai.