Were Rupert Murdoch’s wedding sneakers the ultimate power move?

As a general rule, sneakers with suits are a really bad idea. Unless, perhaps, you’re Rupert Murdoch, the 93-year-old billionaire media mogul who – seemingly chasing Elizabeth Taylor’s total of eight marriages – married his fifth wife on Saturday in a ceremony at his Tuscan-style vineyard in Bel Air. neighborhood of Los Angeles.

Mr Murdoch’s new wife, Elena Zhukova, 67, is a retired molecular biologist who was previously married to Alexander Zhukov, the billionaire Russian energy investor. She was dressed for the occasion in an off-white ankle-length cocktail dress with a square portrait collar and matching pumps.

Age-appropriate (whatever that means), class-appropriate and length appropriate for a daytime wedding, Ms. Zhukova’s outfit was demure and conventional. Mr. Murdoch’s lawsuit against the CEO was also uncontroversial.

However, it was his shoe selection that raised eyebrows in some corners of the internet, where critics predictably mocked the fact that the shoes required with a formal suit were leather shoes hard-soled. Not only does an Oxford or even a Derby “finalize” a formal look, but they are also a coded social signifier of “courtesy and good manners,” as Jim Moore, the creative director of GQ, once noted apropos sport shoes. worn by various politicians to meet with President Biden in the Oval Office.

The way we dress is always some sort of compromise. Even if you’re a star on the Met Gala red carpet, where extreme cuts are commonplace, mobility is routinely sacrificed for optics: female celebrities are sometimes restrained, corseted and, in cases like that of South African singer Tyla, almost immobilized. (Her dress for the gala was so tight at the hem that she had to be lifted up the museum stairs by so-called butlers.)

Men rarely have to endure the kind of sartorial discomfort that women have always been forced to endure. Yet Mr Murdoch’s decision to wear sneakers – although unconfirmed, the shoes appear to be Hokas, not far from the sustainably designed “Transportation” model Mr Biden wore for a visit to the US-Mexico border – at his own wedding might have been an indifferent play from a master of the universe.

“Of course, this might raise eyebrows in some conservative circles, and personally I think sneakers with suits are hideous,” said Eugene Rabkin, editor-in-chief of StyleZeitgeist magazine. “But precariousness has penetrated so far down the chain of formalities that it would almost be punk for him to wear leather shoes.”

Or perhaps it was also a nod to the demands of age and terrain. “He was dressed professionally in a pocket square and tie, so there was nothing halfway,” said Nick Sullivan, the creative director of Esquire. Most likely, adding sneakers for a lawn wedding is common sense, he added.