Long before pretty, anemic girls and Leonardo DiCaprio stuck their fashion-forward feet into Uggs, Russian peasants, soldiers, and pioneers were sporting unbecoming felt boots of their own. They're called valenki: woolen, seamless emblems of the nation's cold history. But Russia's current bazaar offers Italian leathers and designer footwear, with no shortage of cheaper alternatives. Why, then, are these homely things flying off the shelves at $70 per pair? Nationalism? Hipster irony? Nostalgia?

Olga Chernikova, one of the better-known designers in Russia's flourishing valenki couture movement, explains her passion to the New York Times in Stockholm-syndrome terms: "Ms. Chernikova said she couldn’t sit down to eat at the dinner table without a pair of valenki on her feet. 'My body needs them, you could say,' she said." She's more forthright in a Russian-language interview to RussianHunt.ru, a site hawking crossbows and pelts and such: "In the future, we see ourselves as a dizainerski leibl s shou-rumom i monobrendovym magazinom" (yes, "designer label with a showroom and a monobrand boutique"). The product may be rustic but the pitch, well, it barely needs translation.

Moscow: Valenki Boots [NYT]
Валенки круглый год [RussianHunt.ru]