Comfy everyday sneakers that don’t look like “sensible shoes”

So you wear the comfortable ones and feel a bit frumpy, or the pretty ones and spend the afternoon looking for somewhere to sit.

Buying shoes online makes it harder. European sizes, half sizes, “runs small”, “runs large”. It turns into a guessing game, and sending them back is never fun.

That is why we wanted to write to you about Esperanza.

It is a sneaker that has been running for months at a boutique in Latin America, which is usually a good sign that women keep buying it. When we looked closely, we could see why.

Esperanza is a low, laced sneaker with a soft leather‑look upper and visible stitching around the toe and along the sides, a little like a classic boat shoe. It has a padded collar around the ankle, a pull tab at the heel and a rubber sole with a rounded tread.

It comes in seven colours, Beige, White, Black, Brown, Green, Steel Blue and Navy, in sizes AU 5 to 12.

We want to be straight with you about the part that matters most.

It looks like a nice shoe, not a sensible one.

The stitching and the soft colours mean it sits happily with linen pants, a midi dress or your favourite jeans. You can wear it to lunch without anyone thinking “comfort shoe”.

A long morning at the market. A walk along the beach path. School pick-up with the grandkids. A day of sightseeing on holiday.

It is the shoe you reach for when you know you will be out for hours and you would still like to look like yourself.

Esperanza is $79.95 a pair, with free tracked shipping to Australia and New Zealand.

Most women end up wanting a second colour, so we keep the multi-buy simple: buy 2 and save 10%, buy 3 and save 15%, buy 4 or more and save 20%. You can mix colours, and it works across the whole store.

We won’t tell you the sizes are almost gone or that the sale ends tonight. They aren’t, and it doesn’t.

We would tell you to get your size right first, because that is what makes or breaks a shoe you buy online.

Stand on a sheet of paper, mark the tip of your longest toe and the back of your heel, and measure the distance in centimetres. Then choose the size in the table below whose length is about half a centimetre longer than your foot. If you are between two sizes, or your feet are on the wide side, go up a size.

Start with one easy colour, Beige or Navy, and wear it for a week. If you love it, the second pair is 10% off.

And if they don’t fit, you have 30 days from delivery to send them back unworn. Try them on indoors first.

If you have been choosing between shoes that feel good and shoes that look good, Esperanza is our answer: a nice shoe, not a sensible one.