ShoeBlogging

While I'm not ready to steal any thunder from The Manolo, I have been on a quest for the perfect shoe for some years now...but from a paleo health perspective.

My current favorite is this one. I've been wearing softstar shoes for more than a year now. I can't say they're super-durable. I have holes in the last set of shoes from softstar, that I wore solid for 9 months. But damn, are they comfortable, nice, healthy shoes. Effectively, you're barefoot...but with a smidge less toe room than you'd naturally have on a good toe-spreading natural walk. There's certainly room for the toes to spread...Certainly FAR more than a typical shoe. But not as much as purely barefoot. 2mm or 5mm vibram sole. My last pair was 5mm. Currently, 2mm, and SOOO comfortable.

FWIW, I've tried on the Merrell barefoot as well, and in 2 different models, I had 3 problems.

1. The first pair of shoes had a binding top...a (stiff?) leather tongue pressured my foot as I walked a bit on it.
2. The second pair of shoes had a cloth top, and was fine on the top of my foot...but the bottom of the foot had a thick sole (15mm or so, total) so that I couldn't feel the ground as well as I am (now ) used to.
3. The 2nd pair of shoes also had (with the 15mm 3-layer sole) an odd, stiff footprint-shaped footprint. Which left me feeling like my shoes were tilting inward with each step.

If you have any interest in flat/barefoot shoes...I'd check the softstars out.