Yerba Madre’s Dirt Shoes, created in collaboration with New York–based studio Basura, blurs the boundaries between fashion and ecology. Crafted from compacted dirt, tree sap, plant fibres and embedded wildflower seeds, these shoes are built to be worn out. As the wearer walks, they disintegrate and release seeds into the ground, sprouting wildflowers within the wearers path.
The beverage brand’s approach was to turn traditional adverting into a signature avant-garde storytelling concept, centred around the brand’s commitment to sustainable design. “Everything the brand does is about giving back to Mother Earth, so our approach was to come up with an idea that reflected that,” says Basura’s creative lead Rajeev Basu.
The project was conceived to challenge conventional sustainability and durability paradigms. Basu explains that engineering a shoe sturdy enough to support a person—yet fragile enough to return to earth—required months of material experimentation. The final formula uses acacia gum to bind the soil-soil‑fiber mix into a flexible, walkable form. Produced in two universal sizes, the shoes incorporate “break points” inspired by sneaker design.
Yerba Madre’s CMO Emily Kortlang emphasizes that Dirt Shoes do more than spark curiosity—they materialize the brand’s regenerative ethos: “a shoe made of dirt that could support the weight of a person while still being flexible” Rather than disposability or permanence, the product celebrates circularity and ecological design – while promoting the brand’s ethos of leaving the earth better than you found it.
