In the symphonic dissonance between Milanese glamour and Rio de Janeiro’s barefoot irreverence, Havaianas and Dolce&Gabbana strike a radical note once again. For Summer 2025, the duo returns with a second capsule collection that dares to ask: What if the flip-flop was the main character?

The answer arrives not subtly, but with oversized faux fur, leopard roars, Sicilian florals, and macramé-laced straps—a surrealist upgrade of beachwear into something almost ceremonial. This isn’t a remix. It’s a reformation.

The Roots: Zori to Zona Sul, and the Rise of the Rubber Icon

To understand the audacity of this collaboration, we must first rewind to 1962, the year Havaianas was born. Inspired by the Zori sandal—a Japanese design made from cloth and rice straw—the Brazilian brand reimagined it in vulcanized rubber, a material as democratic as it was durable. Cheap, washable, indestructible, and iconically textured, the flip-flop became a national staple.

But Havaianas didn’t stay in the favela. It ascended.

By 1999, when Jean Paul Gaultier sent models striding down the runway in Havaianas, the sandal had already begun its campaign into fashion’s upper tiers. In the two decades since, it has evolved from boardwalk essential to curated streetwear relic—found as easily in a Paris boutique as on Ipanema’s mosaic boardwalk.

The Return: Havaianas x Dolce&Gabbana, Chapter Two

The first Havaianas x Dolce&Gabbana collaboration set the stage: playful, maximalist, undeniably luxe. Yet this second drop is bolder, cleaner in intent, and excessively focused on aesthetic transformation. It’s a portrait of cultural fusion, zoomed in to every strap stitch and print alignment.

There are two storylines to this capsule:

• The Classics: Wild, unapologetic, ’90s-influenced. Featuring plush faux fur straps, leopard and zebra prints, and a chromatic cocktail of golds and blacks. It recalls Gianni Versace’s Miami more than Brazil’s coast, intentionally tilting into drama.
• The Botanicals: Lush, lush, lush. Think Banano prints, baroque florals, and Sicilian garden palettes rendered in emerald, fuchsia, and sun-soaked yellow. Here, Havaianas’ iconic silhouette becomes a wearable canvas for Mediterranean folklore.

Each version is finished with handcrafted elements: macramé, braided cords, and logo embossing that elevates the humble flip-flop into designer artifact. No longer a casual necessity, the Havaianas of 2025 are archived summer opulence.

Material Philosophy: Faux Fur, Rubber, and the Politics of Touch

The decision to drape faux fur across a sandal engineered for sand and sea seems perverse—delightfully so. Yet this incongruity is precisely what makes the collection resonate in a fashion landscape that now favors contradiction over cohesion.

Faux fur is used not for warmth but for statement, an irreverent nod to Dolce&Gabbana’s golden era of over-decoration. Set against vulcanized rubber, the contrast becomes tactile and ideological: luxe versus lo-fi, hyperbole versus history, formality versus poolside carelessness.

Meanwhile, macramé and artisanal braiding signal a turn toward slow craft in fast fashion—an embrace of heritage technique in a world defined by mass production.

Packaging the Myth: Accessories, Custom Details, and The New Desire Economy

What separates this second drop from its predecessor is the attention to detail beyond the footbed. Custom packaging, bespoke dust bags, etched logos, and even limited-edition charms attached to the strap transform each pair into a collectible. This isn’t just a sandal—it’s part of the wider desire economy that fuels luxury consumption today.

Havaianas, once thrown in a suitcase without ceremony, now arrives with the same reverence reserved for a Hermès scarf or Bottega pouch. The shift is conceptual but potent: accessory becomes artifact.

Cultural Dialectics: Brazil and Italy, Tropical and Baroque

The collab works because it speaks fluently in the language of duality. On one hand, we have the carefree Brazilian identity—sun, samba, shoreline. On the other, Italian sensuality—cinema, operatic aesthetics, craftsmanship steeped in drama.

• From Brazil: The flip-flop’s utility, the rubber texture, the casual silhouette.
• From Italy: The print maximalism, the gold embossing, the couture-infused attitude.

It’s a footwear dialectic. Rather than dilute their origins, both brands amplify their own DNA through the lens of the other. It’s collaborative design in its highest form: mutual exaggeration, not compromise.

Visual Codes: Aesthetics of Maximalism in the Post-Minimalist Age

In an era where quiet luxury still dominates editorial headlines, Havaianas x Dolce&Gabbana counters with maximalist defiance. These aren’t sandals for fading into the background. They scream.

The fashion world has become split between silent symbols (stealth wealth) and noisy objects (statementwear). This drop plants its flag firmly in the latter camp, yet it does so with ironic intelligence. It’s self-aware, quoting past glamor while smirking at it.

Photographed against painted Sicilian tile, sun-faded concrete, or glossy pool reflections, the sandals become part of an imagined lifestyle that exists somewhere between a palazzo terrace and a Copacabana street party.

Exclusive Launch: Retail Theatre at FLANNELS

The exclusivity heightens through distribution. Only available at FLANNELS, the collection gains not just retail credibility, but curated luxury context. FLANNELS has positioned itself as the UK’s new luxury playground—young, design-forward, and culture-attuned.

This selective launch model isn’t incidental. It’s theatrical. The brand wants you to hunt for the sandal, to covet the experience as much as the product. With the sneakerification of accessories at an all-time high, this deliberate scarcity repositions the flip-flop as a grail object—less suited to the beach, more fit for the archive.

Impression

This second collection is no longer just a quirky experiment. It’s a rebuttal to hierarchy in fashion.

By turning the low into luxury, the casual into couture, Havaianas x Dolce&Gabbana offers a vision of the modern wardrobe unmoored from traditional categories. It’s a celebration of contradiction: urban and tropical, soft and rough, high and low.

What remains clear is that this isn’t just about footwear. It’s about redefining fashion’s center of gravity—from the heel to the thong strap, from Milan’s ateliers to Brazil’s sidewalks.

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