---
node: garment_huarache
type: garment
slug: huarache
title: "Huarache"
lead: "Huaraches are Mexican sandals whose upper is woven from strips of leather, with no separate straps and often no fastening at all. The weave is the shoe: it holds the foot by tension rather than by buckles."
published: 2026-08-18
updated: 2026-08-18
image_file: huarache.jpg
image_source: "https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Huaraches.jpg"
image_author: "Juanscott — woven leather huaraches at a market, tyre-soled pairs behind"
image_license: "CC BY-SA 4.0"
---

## Overview

Strips of cowhide are cut and interlaced over a last to form a woven upper, which is then lasted to a sole — traditionally leather, and from the mid-twentieth century very often a section of car tyre. The pattern of the weave is regional and can be read: closed toe or open, wide bands or narrow, a woven heel or a plain strap. There is no lining and no padding, and the leather takes the shape of the wearer's foot within a week.

## How it is worn

They are worn barefoot, and a new pair is tight until the weave gives; that stretching is expected and is why they are bought snug. The tyre sole is not a make-do but a preference, because it outlasts leather on stone and gravel. They are everyday footwear rather than costume in much of rural Mexico, and are worn with the trousers ending above the ankle so the weave shows.

## History

Woven sandals are pre-Columbian, and the Purepecha word kwarachi gives the name; the leather-strip form belongs to the colonial period, when cattle made hide cheap and abundant. The tyre sole arrives with motor traffic in the 1930s. Californian surfers took them north in the 1950s and Nike borrowed the name in 1991 for a shoe with no woven leather in it, which is why an English search for huarache now returns two unrelated objects.