Photos: Vincent Picone

We’re excited to announce that after teasing them in our SS22 lookbook earlier this year to much excitement, our mules are finally releasing. Made for us in Portugal using the same calf vegetable tanned leathers as our wallets, our mules arrive in a black and natural leather that will both age beautifully over time. The Italian cowhide has a supple hand with a waxy finish that gives them the perfect amount of shine without being glossy. With wear, we’re certain that both colorways will develop some really nice character. The natural pair will darken quickly from wear and sunlight, while the patina on the black pair will feature grey highlights that become even more prominent with use.

Our mules are built on a cork footbed atop a Vibram mini ripple sole. We’ve used this mini ripple sole on several custom Viberg makeups from years past, which was part of our inspiration to carry the design continuity forward in this new silhouette. While stylish, it also provides some functionality as well: we find the extra traction to help a lot especially when wearing open heeled footwear. As we were aiming for a clean, simplified silhouette without any extraneous strap adjustments, you’ll need to give the upper a week or two to stretch and mold to your foot. As such, we recommend taking your usual size in Birkenstock Bostons if you want to wear them sockless and consider sizing up one if you have feet with a higher instep or plan on styling them with socks.

We love how the simplicity of the silhouette gives the mules lots of versatility across different outfits. They can be worn with some shorts by the pool, or dressed up with socks and cropped slacks. Our friends Jian and Noah, co-founders of @muleboyz on Instagram, styled them out in two unique ways featuring our SS22 collection. Jian has them on with an open-collar linen long sleeve shirt and his trusty CS-120xk jeans, while Noah wears them with the forthcoming Jacquard Vacation Shirt and our Linen Drawstring Pant. We love how they both have been leading the #mulement charge online for years now and are honored to have them onboard to help with the rollout of these new shoes.

Our mules will launch on Thursday, May 12th on 3sixteen.com at noon EDT. You can also find them in-store via our NY and LA flagships on the same day at opening.