The El Paso Baba, $205
We love anything versatile enough to serve our constant wardrobe changes — say, footwear that’s at home at Soho Desert House (if you need to ask, don’t bother) or barhopping through the Fort Worth Stockyards. The Sabah Dealer’s latest style — the El Paso Baba — is a chic, adaptable example and a meaningful marker for the authentic Turkish slipper brand. The shoe is the first style to be ideated and produced in Sabah’s first U.S. factory, located in El Paso, Texas. (Previously, all production took place at Sabah’s Gaziantep, Turkey workshop.)
The new El Paso Baba ($205), produced in limited runs of 250 pairs, sold out online within three hours, prompting a waitlist for the next go-round. (A third restock dropped last week.) The neutral shoe is crafted with undyed, vegetable-tanned saddle leather, making it a perfect slip-on travel companion.
Three years in the making, the factory in El Paso, which opened in April 2022, was envisioned as a place to experiment with groundbreaking methods and materials, such as vegetable tanning and up-cycled denim. It’s also the root of collaboration: the vibrant By Day and By Night Babas ($205) were dreamed up with Istanbul-based LAR Studio and handcrafted in the El Paso factory. The West Texas team of 12 consists of former cowboy boot makers, so rest assured, they know their way around rich leathers. (And a shoe that gets more gorgeous with every wear.)
Sabah began in 2013, when Dallas native Mickey Ashmore, inspired by the craftsmanship of traditional Turkish slippers, left his finance job and began selling a modern take on the handmade leather shoes out of his East Village apartment in New York. Today, there are five Sabah Houses across the world, from New York and London to Dallas’ Uptown neighborhood (2312 Routh Street).
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