Tieks by Gavrieli

I think everyone has heard of Tieks.

Its known for being the "Ballet Flat, Reinvented" and has those turquoise soles.

Basically flats that are 100% premium, soft, top-grain leather with non-elasticized, cushioned back and non-skid rubber soles and cushioned instep. Its $175 so its a pretty steep price tag and only comes in whole sizes.

There's a huge cult following that talk about how much they love this shoe and how its worth it, even with the $175 cost.


I was first introduced to the shoe when one of my co-workers during my 2nd year of pharmacy residency training was wearing it and said how comfortable it was. Me, as a lazy person who enjoys shoes that looks cute but comfortable to wear, immediately wanted to buy them. Of course I was a poor pharmacy resident and definitely could not afford to spend almost $200 on shoes, let alone ballet flats...

So it went on my list of things to buy when I get a real job.

Fast forward to today and I finally decided ok, maybe I'll spend this money and actually get them.

First impressions!

• Packaging
• Packaging is beautiful. It comes in a blue box with a flower ribbon and a hand written card, what more can you ask? 
• It also comes with a shoe cover and one of those foldable grocery bags
• Color
• Got the poppy, which is a beautiful color don't get me wrong, but for my first pair of Tieks and for spending almost $200, I kinda regret not getting a more normal color just so I could wear it more often without having to color coordinate my outfits 
• Fit
• I'm a true size 7 and size 7 fit well. My friend did say that she could see my big toe imprint so if you're not a fan of that, something to keep in mind
• Foldability
• Yes! they fold up well and since they come with a shoe cover thing, its great for carrying around!

Day one
(Wore them to work where I walk from the parking lot, to my office and back, occasionally  walk up 5 flights of stairs [the stairs are faster than the elevator, I've raced it before]):

• Well besides the general tightness of the flat around the top of my foot, no major problems. My toe was pretty sore though from constantly being pulled upwards? Maybe it needs to be broken in some more? 

Day two
(Wore them to visit my friend in New York and walked a total of ~10 miles, per my iPhone in them)

• I figured I needed to break them in and what better way to do that then wear them to the city where you mostly walk around all day? Terrible idea. People boast about how they can wear these all day in Disneyland and on Europe trips and all... Not me. I thought I was dying. My feet were getting blisters around the heel area, my toe was cramping up because of all those same issues from Day one wear. When I got home and took them off, I couldn't even bend my toe it hurt so much. My feet definitely felt like they had been walking around for 10 miles barefoot since there's no real arch support either. So... pretty disappointed, although I managed to wear them for 10 miles? I haven't been able to test them out again because my feet are still recovering from a couple days ago. Hopefully I've broken them in now? Will update my next run!

Final thoughts?

• I've only worn them twice now so still too early to tell but from a pain perspective, my toe hurts. I think it may be my foot in general? Wearing other ballet flats for long periods of time also makes my foot crampy too. I'll have to keep on trying it out to see if its just the initial breaking in process.