Fashion Trends

Amal Clooney Joins the Cork Wedge Club

July 31, 2023

Amal Clooney in a black dress and sun hat

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We’re on the cusp of August, which means Leonardo DiCaprio is on a superyacht in Sardinia, the Kardashians have traded Calabasas for Caribbean islands and red states, and the Clooneys have decamped from Sonning-on-Thames to Lake Como, where they’re eating lobster tagliolini at Il Gatto Nero and sipping Select spritzes on the Grand Hotel Tremezzo terrace.

And, as anyone who’s worked in fashion journalism for more than 42 seconds will tell you, there’s nothing that gets a certain section of the internet hitting Facebook’s “Love” button quite like seeing what made it into Amal’s Bric’s Milano suitcases for her annual Italian sojourn. Mercifully, since arriving in Lombardy this month, the human rights lawyer has eschewed any tomato girl summer cosplay in favor of her signature aesthetics. To wit: disco glamour and classic polish.

Thus far, in terms of looks destined for Pinterest boards, there’s been an outing in a lacy Christian Dior slip courtesy of John Galliano’s spring 1999 collection; a date night in an iridescent Paco Rabanne babydoll, proving there’s nothing “unwearable” about Julien Dossena’s updates on the house’s ’60s chainmail dresses; and a vintage Alaia sundress that she wore to cruise around the lago on Friday with six-year-old twins Ella and Alexander in tow.

It’s her footwear on the latter occasion, though, that’s turned Vogue House into an office divided. Specifically, Clooney got papped in a cork wedge heel, a style beloved of J-Lo, the Princess of Wales and—since 2006—literally no one else. And yet, it’s the silhouette’s second high-profile outing this week, with Nicola Peltz wearing a bold, gold pair to lunch at Club 55 in St Tropez – which some editors found appealing nostalgic, and others found unappealingly orthopaedic. Consider them the anti-slingback.

Shop a selection of cork wedges, below.