Katy Perry grounded her return to Paris Couture Week in a pair of Balenciaga’s most surreal stilettos to date: the Space pump, a molded, flocked heel from the brand’s 51st couture collection. She wore the style to attend the brand’s fall 2025 couture show on Wednesday.
Made in Italy and retailing for 3,000 euros (approximately $3,500), the shoes are formed from EVA and finished with a velvet-effect texture, giving the illusion of plush suede without a single seam or stitch in sight.
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The 11-centimeter stiletto heel is set slightly inward, a deliberate design choice that shifts the silhouette’s balance and creates an optical illusion when viewed from the side. Unlike the rounded, bulbous Space 2.0 men’s sneaker released in previous collections, the Space pump reads sleeker and more sculptural, designed to feel alien and editorial all at once.
Perry paired the heels with a black blazer minidress that doubled as couture armor. With exaggerated shoulders and a notched sweetheart neckline, the dress fastened diagonally with tonal buttons. The hem hit midthigh, exposing the full length of the pump and giving it visual priority — a common tactic in recent Demna-led shows, where footwear leads the silhouette.
This is Perry’s third consecutive couture show with the brand. Last July, she went viral in a topless oversize coat and shredded tights. Two months later, she zipped herself into a “baggage dress” crafted from trompe l’oeil luggage panels and stiletto boots. Each look leaned hard into the house’s most extreme references, but this week’s felt more refined — still sculptural, still weird, but sleeker and more strategic.
The Space pump also marks a pivot away from Balenciaga’s recent distressed-heavy footwear, like the Destroyed Speedcat or Worn-Out Hamptons sneaker, in favor of high-sheen abstraction. Perry has consistently used Balenciaga’s more extreme shoe designs to punctuate her looks, often letting them do the talking even when the garments lean minimal. Whether it’s molded EVA, blade stilettos or fused tights-as-shoes, her footwear choices track right alongside Demna’s weirdest instincts.