Kanye West goes couture

The jack of all trades has has done it again. Kanye West was approached by Louis Vuitton to design some couture kicks for the high end brand. Despite his own dubious fashion choices - of the "yeah boyee", Cosby persuasion - I had no reason to expect the worst when I heard about this venture. Then the shoes debuted on the Louis Vuitton runway.

To hear him brag on his video blog, you would think he invented the stiletto, but no, he just RE-invented the sneaker, circa 1980. The enticing qualities: they come in bright colors, are extra bendy and by some miracle aren't plastered with KW monograms. So, just how did Kanye tap into his creative genius to bring us this foot candy?

We started from the sole. We made it lighter weight and flexible, so you can bend it…. I was inspired by the movie “Dune” because, as you know, I love sci-fi…. The collection had all these jackets that were very padded. They looked like maybe they had hockey pads in the jacket, and there was one where the collar came up really high. I took that element and I put that on the back of the shoe. It’s like the opposite of the tongue. Usually you have the tongue at the front. [This is] like a tongue at the back.

Riiiight. My vote is that he sticks to rapping. No word on how much these backwards shoes are selling for, but I think it's a safe bet that the only Kanye-inspired apparel I can afford are those venetian blinds sunglasses.