Preview: Laces Out! Trainer Festival

When Karl Lagerfeld decided to have Chanel's 2014 S/S haute couture shown by sneaker-sporting models, the humbly athletic footwear officially came of age.

Perhaps it was the spring in their step that made the rest of the earth’s population follow in the models’ footsteps, but, from bloggers to terribly hip Scandinavians to Anna Dello Russo to your mum, everybody put on trainers. They take the edge off stiff dresses, brighten up a severely black pair of trousers and manage to make a pencil skirt look relaxed. No wonder the first edition of the Laces Out! trainer festival held in Liverpool last October was a slam-dunk hit.

For those who are now ready to leave their Stan Smiths behind and step into a set of more exciting trainers, all things sneaky will once again congregate in Liverpool’s Camp and Furnace on 7 March, from 12.30pm until 6.30pm. Stalls will be filled with a range of extraordinary shoes and clothing from skate shop Lost Art, Scotts Menswear, worldwide sneakerfreaks Ran, 80s Casuals, Ricci, the English-made denim of Alarleo, and MyDopeSocks.

Mayo Customs will be there to cater to the more individual tastes in footwear, while Chris Anderson’s cardboard trainers are for those of more elevated aesthetic leanings; also present will be Crep Protect and Krate & Co to keep everyone’s shoe collections tidy, and Cutthroat Pete to take care of the excessively hairy. With tunes by Mighty Mojo and an all-day bar, conditions are looking good for a veritable orgy of comfortable footwear. Find out what’s next for the ubiquitous trainer, and see if its reign of colourful mobility will run on.