Melissa and Susan Fang Reimagine Three Iconic Jelly-Shoe Silhouettes

Jelly shoes are not supposed to move you. They're supposed to be fun, a little trashy in the best way, the shoe you wore to the beach at age seven and found in a bin at a market twenty years later. Melissa has always understood this, and the brand has built an entire design philosophy around turning that simple translucent PVC shell into something worth coveting. But what the latest collaboration with London-based Chinese designer Susan Fang does is something different: it transforms Melissa's iconic silhouettes through a sculptural, artisanal lens, where footwear becomes wearable art.

Fang, who has previously worked on shoes with Ugg, & Other Stories and Nike, is now reimagining signature Melissa silhouettes through her ethereal, nature-inspired approach to design. A Central Saint Martins graduate who launched her label in 2017, Fang was shortlisted for the LVMH Prize in 2019 and took home the Creative Pioneer Award from the Yu Prize in 2021. She is the kind of designer whose work carries a specific emotional charge: flowers that mean something, gradients that reference the quality of morning light, silhouettes that feel like they belong in a dream you almost remember. That sensibility, applied to a jelly shoe, should not work as well as it does.

"Working with Melissa and its PVC jelly material allowed us to create a super surreal shoe," Fang told Footwear News. "I have always admired Melissa for their ability to turn shoes into dreams. It was magical to work on the collection together."

The result is three distinct silhouettes, each in four pastel colorways, that collectively make the case for jelly shoes as a serious design object.

Melissa Luna Bloom

The Luna Bloom introduces a ballet flat that blends art, innovation, and contemporary femininity. Strategic cutouts, delicately applied floral details, and a subtly sporty upper create a silhouette that feels both modern and poetic. Crafted in Melflex with a secure strap closure, the design reflects Fang's organic, fluid aesthetic while embracing Melissa's signature irreverence and sophistication. Minimalist yet expressive, this ballet flat is an elegant, personality-packed choice for everyday style.

It is the most wearable piece in the collection and probably the one you reach for first. The floral detailing is dimensional rather than printed, which means it catches light in a way that flat graphics never could. On a translucent PVC base, that effect tips from decorative into genuinely architectural.

Melissa Possession Platform Sakura

The Possession Platform Sakura brings an exclusive, artistic reinterpretation of the Possession Platform II. Strategic cutouts and delicately applied floral details reflect Fang's organic, sculptural aesthetic, adding fluidity and modernity to the iconic Melissa silhouette. While the design feels fresh and expressive, it stays true to the platform's signature comfort and versatility. The result is a sophisticated, original statement piece full of personality, perfect for those seeking a contemporary and elegant look.

The sakura accents are the collection's most overtly symbolic gesture. Fang thinks about luck and fortune a lot, and in Chinese culture, certain flowers carry that meaning. Cherry blossom on a platform jelly shoe is not the obvious move, but in Fang's hands the reference lands with precision rather than decoration. The sculptural quality of the petals, rendered in Melissa's PVC, gives the classic Possession silhouette a new vertical drama that reads from across a room.

Melissa Daphnis Ballerina

The Daphnis Ballerina is an elegant flat that captures Susan Fang's signature femininity. A refined flat capturing Fang's elegance, fluidity, and modern femininity. Where the Luna Bloom leans into graphic floral detail and the Possession Platform Sakura commands attention through height and sculptural bloom, the Daphnis Ballerina is the quietest and perhaps most considered piece in the capsule. It is also the shoe where the opaque-to-transparency gradient technique reads most clearly: husband and industrial designer Orelio de Jonghe had the idea of opaque-to-transparency, which was described as a really unique addition to shoe design. The gradient shifts from fully opaque to crystal-clear transparency, and the colours had to honour that journey without interrupting it.

The design process behind the collection

The collaboration was unusually close, even by the standards of creative footwear partnerships. For this collection, Fang worked closely with her husband Orelio de Jonghe, an industrial designer, to push what was possible. Orelio, an ex-Dyson senior industrial designer, approaches a design problem from a completely different place than Fang does, and that friction is where the most interesting things happen.

De Jonghe was direct about what made this project different from previous collaborations. "With this collaboration, we definitely had the most control," he told Footwear News. "We had a very strong vision of what we wanted to do from the beginning. From the first 3D-printed prototype we made at home all the way to the end product, the shoes came out very closely to our original vision. Admittedly, we had some crazy ideas in the beginning, and with the help of the Melissa team, that dream came true."

Using technology, the team was able to merge surreal design ideas into reality and push the boundary of shoe design. They also used technology to express the core of nature through mathematical formulas, using these formulas to create the geometric pattern of the shoe, to plan how flowers can blossom and place around the designed shoe silhouette in the most natural and harmonious way nature truly acts. Experimenting with technology pushed the boundary of shoe and accessories design, as these cinematic 3D programs aren't typically used in fashion.

The signature conceptual element threading through all three silhouettes is what Fang describes as the lucky flower shoe. Fang and de Jonghe designed a lucky flower shoe that blossoms 360 degrees around the foot, a symbol of fortune and love for whoever wears it. The spiritual dimension is not incidental to the design; it is the design. "We also explored new techniques with Melissa to achieve a magical gradient that shifts from opaque to crystal-clear transparency, so the shoe feels like something from a dream, impossibly delicate, like glass, yet incredibly soft against the skin," Fang added. "Our wish is that when people slip these on, they feel held by their own dreams, wrapped in a fantasy of joy and miracles."

Crafted in a soft pastel palette, the collection evokes lightness, femininity, and a sense of dreamlike optimism. Each style arrives in four distinct colorways, offering expressive versatility while maintaining the collection's cohesive, ethereal mood. The color story, as Fang described it, came directly from observation: soft pinks, milky whites, that particular quality of early morning before the sun is fully up.

Romance is at the core of Susan Fang's design approach, with florals infused throughout in 3D motifs and soft elements that transform Melissa's signature styles into contemporary kicks. Almost otherworldly, this is one for the fairy-core girlies. But the technical precision underneath that romance is what makes the collection hold up beyond the season. A 3D-printed prototype built at home, a gradient developed specifically for PVC, an industrial designer who used to work at Dyson engineering flowers that bloom around your foot in mathematically calibrated formation: this is not a mood board made physical. It is a genuinely considered piece of footwear design that happens to look like something from a fever dream, and that combination is exactly why it works.