Hugo Boss Debuts Pineapple-Leather Vegan Sneakers

Hugo Boss recently launched a new line of vegan sneakers made with pineapple-based leather. The limited-edition shoes are part of the BOSS Menswear collection and are available in four colors: blue, black, brown, and yellow. The shoes are made with Piñatex—a vegan alternative to leather made with the fruit’s leaf fibers, a waste byproduct of the pineapple industry, developed by Spanish designer Carmen Hijosa. The biodegradable material sells for between $5 to $15 per square meter—making it more affordable than animal leather. “The pineapple leaves used to create this unique textile require no extra resources to grow and provide farming communities with an additional income,” Hugo Boss explained in a statement. The company described the shoe line as “footwear that makes a minimal imprint on the planet and offers a sleek BOSS look.” Piñatex is among a growing number of alternatives recently developed to replace animal leather, including nat-2’s fungi leather, VEERAH’s apple peel-based leather, and Modern Meadow’s collagen-based leather.