Kobi Levi shoes were an oddly formative part of how I understand and relate to fashion today—even though I’ve never seen a single pair in the wild.
Personally, I’ve just never really been a “high heel person”.
Sure, I love them on other people. And I’ve always admired the strangely provocative space they hold in our collective visual vocabulary.
But Kobi Levi shoes? These heels were different.
The first time I ever saw a pair of “Chewing Gum” sneakers, I must’ve been fourteen or fifteen years old.
And I was absolutely blown away.
Despite the intimidating price tag, it wasn’t impossible to imagine myself owning a pair one day. And, the sheer quality and creativity of the pieces made them feel more like design marvels than clothing that demanded a specific aesthetic.
It’s a feeling I rarely experience when new fashion trends emerge. And I still think about them often when trying to articulate exactly what I love about fashion.
They were, and still are in many ways, aspirational pieces for me—bold, eccentric fashion art you could own. And I’m not the only one who felt that way.
A New Kind of Luxury: Handmade, Weird, and Entirely Online
In the 2010s, photos of these shoes were everywhere—design mood boards, Pinterest collections, “look at these weird heels” articles, and boredom-buster design blogs.
The internet was naturally intrigued. While the fashion world seemed genuinely surprised by the designer’s work.
Vogue Italia even once described Kobi Levi as “A genius of reinterpretation“—a designer who could trap animals, everyday objects, and entire visual metaphors inside a pair of stilettos.
And yet, despite the early hype—and the Kobi Levi website still operating successfully in 2025—his presence in the physical fashion world feels strangely underutilized.
To my mind, Kobi Levi’s work is theatrical, sculpted and visually explosive. Even enlightening at times.
Qualities which would make them perfect for red carpet stylists with a taste for the avant-garde.
Or aesthetic-obsessed influencers with expensive tastes.
In theory, his designs should be everywhere surreal fashion happens: Met Gala carpets, Cannes steps, hyper-stylized awards season looks.
And yet, the voice of the designer himself lives primarily in a handful of in-depth features like this Business Times piece, this one from Fashion United and a couple from the Jerusalem Post.
While his shoes seem to exist mostly as museum curiosities and moodboard artifacts.
This isn’t because the shoes are inaccessible (they are arguably more accessible than most couture footwear), nor because they’re too niche or impractical.
Instead, I feel it reflects something stranger: the way the internet turned Levi’s designs into a visual language — images meant to be shared, saved, memed, and marvelled at — while refusing to acknowledge them as functional objects.
The result is a fascinating contradiction: shoes designed with enough care to be worn, yet celebrated overwhelmingly as beautiful fantasies.
So, Who Is Kobi Levi?
“My world is that of everyday glamour, the glamour that goes unnoticed…”
A 2001 graduate of the Bezalel Academy of Art and Design, Levi has always been “intuitively attracted”, even obsessed with the interesting shapes and ideas offered by the silhouette of shoes.
In high school he built his early models out of cardboard.
In college, where he studied accessory design, he finally learned how to bring his talents as a designer and his love of shoes to life using real leather and old-school atelier practices.
“I envisaged [each shoe] as a piece of art you live with [where] shoes must have a life of their own, even when they are not worn.”
For years after that, he made shoes privately—just for himself in the side room of his tiny apartment—and stored them away in boxes.
They weren’t a business. They were an ongoing, private artistic obsession.
Then in April of 2010, he launched a simple blog where he uploaded several photos of the fantastical footwear he’d been creating.
The reception was overwhelmingly positive.
The Internet Loved Him—But Did the Fashion World?
Kobi Levi’s designs looked like nothing else: birds mid-swoop, coffee cups mid-pour, mallard ducks and bananas peeling themselves open.
They were cheeky, animated, humorous and undeniably sculptural.
Blogs praised him. Moodboards immortalized him. And galleries would eventually begin to take notice of his unique artistic perspective.
“I’ve had solo exhibitions as well as group exhibitions in Northampton Shoe Museum and Art Gallery, the UK, the Museu du Calcado-Sao Joao De Madeira in Portugal, the APM shopping centre, Hong Kong and Shanghai, the Parasol Projects in NYC, Boca-Raton, the USA, the Mudec Museum, Milan, the Grassi Museum Leipzig, Germany, the Stadtmuseum Munich and many more…”
But at the time, the designs only existed as artifacts—viral images to share and admire as spectacle. Never as objects you imagined on the body despite their artistic intention.
That changed the moment Lady Gaga’s stylist took notice.
The Gaga Effect: How A Music Video Changed Everything
“I got a call one day from fashion director and […] editor Nicola Formichetti, who was outfitting Lady Gaga [for a music video]. He asked me to send him a few options…”
At first, the designer thought he was being pranked.
After fourteen years of designing shoes and a year of viral internet fame, he’d never sold a single pair.
He didn’t even know how much to charge.
“I was super surprised because at the time I had no studio, just a small blog with photos. I was making the shoes my size because nobody wore them…showing them to friends and then putting them in boxes,”
The studio settled on ordering several pairs of his “Double Boot” design for the singer to wear in her 2011 hit music video, Born This Way.
The boots arrived on time. They were worn alongside stunning pieces by other talented designers, then returned and eventually exhibited at a shoe museum in the Netherlands.
(Apparently, another set was also put on display at Tel Aviv’s Periscope Gallery).
This was the moment that Kobi Levi crossed over into Pop Culture History.
“It was incredibly exciting. I felt like I was part of the production, and I was on pins and needles waiting to see how it would come out in the end. It’s amazing when someone so famous, who can choose anything they want from anywhere in the world, chooses to use one of your designs that you created in your own studio.”
But being a part of an iconic moment in music history wasn’t the only benefit.
The overnight surge in demand allowed the designer to open a small studio in Tel Aviv.
New fans flooded his inbox. Collectors reached out. And Kobi Levi shoes made it into more and sometimes, unexpected places.
From Whoopi to Eurovision: The Select Few Who Actually Wear Them
The few times Kobi Levi shoes have appeared in the wild, they’re almost always attached to a celebrity or stylist with a taste for the avant-garde
Whoopi Goldberg, known for wearing distinctive and often whimsical shoes on The View, wore a pair of Kobi Levi’s iconic, black and white “Chewing Gum” sneaker heels when she appeared on a 2012 episode alongside then President, Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama.
The same year, Whoopi was also seen sporting a pair of low, “Banana” heels to the Paris premiere of the Sister Act stage show.
“Whoopi Goldberg […] contacted me directly, and not through a stylist. She sent me an email requesting a few different designs. She owns quite a few pairs of my [shoes]. I think that’s pretty awesome, I must admit. And I’ve met her a number of times while I was on trips overseas.”
In 2016, two pairs of Kobi Levi shoes appeared in the music video for M.I.L.F $ by Fergie.
This included one pair of “Flamingos” worn by a background extra and a quick, blink and you’ll miss it moment where Fergie wears the iconic “Chewing Gum” heels while jumping rope.
Swedish stylist B Akerlund, who designs for the likes of Beyonce and Kim Kardashian, has put at least 13 of the Israeli’s designs in her showroom.
While Kobi Levi has also collaborated with Skins Footwear and a variety of Israeli and International brands as a freelance designer.
With one design, a custom pair of Sneaker Boots, even making it onto the Eurovision stage for Netta Barzilai’s winning, 2018 grand finale performance of “Toy”.
A Celebrity Favorite That Hasn't Gotten a Follow Up
Together, all these moments position Levi’s shoes as something of a cultural artifact.
But the mythos is still heavily tied to Lady Gaga. With many articles to this day still highlighting that ‘Lady Gaga’s a fan!” and reusing titles like “Kobi Levi shoes find famous friends” to draw readers in—even though he’s grown well past that moment.
“I usually deal with celebs’ stylists, who are responsible for creating a certain look for their clients”.
“Some women regularly purchase shoes directly from me, and sometimes my shoes are used in a photo shoot for a magazine, video clip or to be worn at an event. In these cases, the shoes are returned to me afterward.”
Quietly, Kobi Levi is consistently finding showrooms, buyers, and exhibition spaces in the present day.
And yet, the internet is still, largely stuck in the 2010s when it comes to discussing his work.
The Vision: Wearable Sculptures With a Life of Their Own
The appeal of Kobi Levi shoes as wearable works of art or collectible oddities is intuitive and obvious.
They have a unique kind of conceptual clarity and animation rarely seen in footwear design, with each shoe being a pop culture statement piece no matter the shape and size.
Sometimes, even crossing into activism like his 2023 interview with the Jerusalem Post regarding an upcoming International Women’s Day Exhibition at Ramat Aviv’s Ofer Mall where he said, “No society is whole without women, and if women were not there, their absence would be felt strongly,”
“Most of my designs are of high-heeled shoes, since I consider shoe design a form of art, and it’s much easier to come up with interesting, three-dimensional shapes on shoes with high heels.
However, when I’m creating a new design, I don’t decide ahead of time if it’s going to be a flat shoe, high heels or boots – I just go wherever my inspiration leads me.”
A literal take on “pencil thin” stiletto heels here. A sneaker covered in gum, raised mid-step there. A white, porcelain coffee cup mid-pour.
Some designs are gravity-defying or childishly crass, others are deceptively simple and striking.
And yet, whether you find them incredibly ugly or elegant, they are all, always interesting and wildly imaginative.
Why the Internet Fell in Love With His Shoes (And Why That Love Was Complicated
Many designers claim their shoes are “wearable art.” Levi is one of the few who means it literally.
“My inspiration comes from all aspects of life: animals, nature, day-to-day situations, celebs, media and lots of other places…Like when you’re walking down the street, watching TV or listening to music, it’s everything that’s around us,”
In an interview with Ideastream, the designer described how some of his most popular shoe designs of birds came to him during a walk in the city.
“I just saw a bird eating something from the sidewalk, and I saw that silhouette that I like of high heels…I took the toucan, the ducks and the swans. It’s the same structure, the same overall design but stylized in a different bird type,”
But even he isn’t without his doubts when it comes to trusting the process.
“You have to find technical solutions. I go through phases where I think I’m crazy, that it’s impossible, then I’m afraid that in a second everything could tear or break.” “Then suddenly it starts to look like the original sketches and then I get the heady feeling of having given life to a fantasy.”
The Tension Between Art Object and Functional Footwear
Currently, Kobi Levi has an online store where you can order your own pair of limited edition heels.
Each pair is then hand-stitched, carved, painted and pressed by Levi using a vintage sewing machine, leather press and whatever materials best suit the concept.
Many designs are only available in limited runs of 20 pairs or less, and every order is “made to measure”.
The shoes themselves seem to be primarily purchased by customers in the US and Western Europe, with the average price for a pair being anywhere from $800 to $1,000.
“I didn’t plan for my designs to be more popular overseas; it just turned out that way.”
But what I find most interesting about his work is that the designer has always insisted his creations really are made to be worn despite their unconventional appearance.
And the level of quality and attention to detail would suggest this is true.
But the way the Kobi Levi myth has developed has always carried with it a kind of incredulity about this specific claim.
“Everything starts with a fantasy, then it becomes a challenge.”
Levi sources sustainable materials like patent leather, suede, and wood, which allow for his many whimsical design ideas.
But they are all structurally sound. And many of his more conservative heels could easily fit a Louboutin fanatic or a high-end influencer’s wardrobe.
But maybe this crossover hasn’t happened because the artist himself doesn’t necessarily see his work that way.
“It’s not supposed to be comfortable. It’s supposed to be beautiful. You don’t wear them to jog. You wear them to look great.”
The Limits of Going Viral in The New Attention Economy
Kobi Levi’s design exist in a strange crossroads between design, art and fashion. And at some point, the image became the product.
But the realities of scaling something like that in the high fashion world feel very underdiscussed.
In a 2015 interview with the Jerusalem Post, Kobi Levi mentions that he still teaches design classes to augment his income and that, combined with his shoe sales, is enough to make a living.
This is likely because Kobi Levi doesn’t enjoy the same production scale benefits and connections that an established fashion house has access to.
But there are some unique factors that have helped shaped Israel’s reputation for young, bold and surprisingly sustainable fashion designers that place him in good company for the future.
It also takes several months to create a new model, and several weeks to reproduce each one.
So, once Levi receives around 20 orders, he usually moves on to new projects.
“I do everything – from concept all the way to the finished product at my studio. When I need help, I bring in assistants and students to give me a hand.”
But the actual conversation around his work seems largely out of his hands.
“Artists can say my shoes aren’t art because they are a wearable product, and designers can say they’re not design because they don’t follow trends and they don’t serve customers. And I can say to them, you’re both right. You can fight about it or not, and I don’t care.”
Still, he’s taken it in stride.
“It is important to me that my artistic shoes will be wearable and well-crafted and not become toys.”
Still, the mythos that surrounds his work continues to be peppered with adjectives like ‘outlandish’ and “not for the faint-hearted,” with many bloggers expressing a desire to own a pair of Kobi Levi shoes “for their collection.”
A Different Kind of Status Symbol
Kobi Levi often makes limited runs of each design, which makes them feel somewhat collectible.
But compared to fashion giants like Louboutin, Choo or Manolo Blahnik, Levi’s shoes are best understood as symbols of rebellious imagination, not social status.
The shoes are “luxury” in the sense that they’re rare, highly crafted and expensive, but the appeal has always been more about owning a piece of art or a fashion-forward design than an elite brand name.
To those who appreciate fashion as a form of artistic expression, Kobi Levi’s shoes represent something different—fun, experimental, and innovative.
They appeal to people who want something that feels exclusive and tied to the world of high fashion while allowing them to participate in the art and fantasy of it all.
“Each design is a star [and] doesn’t mean to complete a total look, but rather create and lead the look that follows it.”
Accessible Fantasy in a World of Closed-Door Couture
For people without access to traditional luxury culture, his shoes represented participation in high fashion’s ideas but in a way that was less reliant on traditional notions of class and wealth.
No private droplists or exclusive buyers. No overstock burning. If you had the money, you could own a pair of Kobi Levi’s and buy them right from a basic web 2.0 store page.
It’s the closest thing I can think of to a democratization of the haute couture dream. Luxury without elitism.
And that vibe was a perfect match for the ethos of early 2010s internet culture: fashion as a moodboard and a digital identity.
For a brief moment, art and fashion were something you curated rather than something you consumed.
And Kobi Levi’s shoes gave people highly expressive statement pieces to dream about.
Something Kobi Levi seems to have always understood.
“I want people to enjoy it when they look at it, not necessarily if they buy it or use it. It’s art, so you can present it on a podium, in a gallery, or you can wear it and be inside the art,”
The Blurry, Line Between Designer and "Artist" Has Always Been Hard to Navigate
Avant-garde creations generally find and create their own niche.
And Kobi Levi has found his own in the world of museums, galleries, art collections and selected boutiques.
And many would argue that artistic designs are completely different than commercial products in every aspect.
But, I can’t help thinking of Jean Paul Gaultier’s insistence that “Fashion is not art.” even adding the word “Never.” to drive home how strongly he felt about it.
Gauthier, despite also having a reputation for unconventional, highly sculptural pieces drew a distinct line between the two disciplines.
He often described seeing making clothes as his “way of communicating”. Appreciating the theatricality and expression, while also maintaining that fashion itself is not fine art.
Many Gauthier comments mirror sentiments littered throughout Kobi Levi’s interviews, like this Gauthier quote about where he finds his inspiration, “My only fashion school was what I saw in the newspapers and on television”.
So, it’s interesting to compare where these two designers differ in their approach.
Conclusion
Once you see a pair of Kobi Levi shoes you’ll never forget it. But quantifying whether they count as art objects, shoes or some combination of the two can be tricky.
The market has largely decided to categorize them as art pieces fit for art galleries and personal collections.
I see them as slept on fashion obsessions for young, affluent creators. You might see content fodder or a fun listicle.
But what we can all agree on is that Kobi Levi has found success in a unique, unexpected niche.
And even if his fashion journey never looks like the typical designer career path, it’s a fantastic example for aspiring designers with unusual tastes. And a body of work to be proud of.
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