The story behind uggs
Image Credit: Ugg Australia Ad from 1985 by artist Ken Auster via ShredSledz
One trend I did not expect to come back over the past few years are ugg boots.
Uggs. Ugg. Ugg Boots. Uggos. My Uggs. I never know what to call them, but after looking into them, the confusion starts to make more sense. Stay with me – we’ll get there together.
As all good folklore goes, the internet is divided on who ‘invented’ these and their true origins.
For me, their nostalgia exists within Canadian winters, pairing them with my kilt uniform in high school then transitioning to outfits with leggings-as-pants and skinny jeans (how dare she) in university.
They were the easy, versatile go-to’s – going out for breakfast on a Saturday, making the trek to class in a blizzard, and throwing them on for day-to-day, mundane errands.
But what’s the story behind these cultural phenomena? Let’s dig in.
A rural beginning
Most sources agree that earliest origins are the early 1900s in rural Australia with shepherds and farmers, wearing sheepskin with leather straps which later evolved into boots.
The reason? The sheepskin was resistant to lanolin, a wax secreted from sheep, which would rot the farmer’s ordinary boots (pretty disgusting, but now that same lanolin is often used in skincare today, or so the internet tells me).
It’s believed that these farmers gave pieces of sheepskin to their children to wear as slippers indoors, and popularity within Australia grew, with the first commercial manufacturing of ugg boots taking place in 1930, and in 1950 the boots were sold as souvenirs.
You might be wondering (I know I was) why Aussies called them uggs? It’s a short form for ugly, since people found them – well, ugly.
Isn’t it so nice when we can all agree on something?
Going mainstream
But it wasn’t until nearly twenty years later that the ugg boots we know today would become mainstream thanks to surfing culture (yes, surfing culture), a determined Aussie travelling to California and the 90’s sneaker craze.
In the 1960’s, while trying to keep his feet warm, Australian surfer Brian Smith started experimenting with adding sheepskin lining to the inside of his boots. Popularity quickly grew within his surfing community – according to interviews, surfers liked his uggs because the fleece absorbed the water, removed the sand and provided warmth after getting out of the ocean.
As Smith’s uggs were becoming a local surfer staple, Australian culture was rising within Californian surf culture. Noticing this growing trend, the entrepreneur headed to the USA, founded Ugg Australia in 1978, and trademarked the term “Ugg” in the USA.
From there, Smith allegedly began selling to the Californian surf community from the trunk of his car on the beach – and I love that for him.
Image Credit: Ugg Australia Ad from the Feb. 1985 issue of Surfer Magazine, via ShredSledz
Confusion enters the chat
This is where the story of who invented what starts to get a little bit murky.
As Smith was finding commercial success in the USA, other surfers and surfer enthusiasts began trademarking iterations like “Uggs”, “Ugg Boots” and began selling their own versions – claiming they created the growing phenomena.
One of these competitors saw success through an endorsement from Australian Olympian Shirley Strickland de la Hunty, but Smith took it one step further and garnered global attention when the US Olympic team wore Ugg Australia at the 1994 Winter Olympics.
(I’d include a photo of the ’94 fit for you – but it’s honestly not much of a serve and is highly copyrighted. Allow me to link it here for you and let me know what you think!)
But let’s get back to it, shall we?
Leveraging this growing popularity, Smith eventually bought out the other major competing trademarks, ultimately selling Ugg Australia to California-based Deckers Outdoor Corporation for $14.6 million in 1995 – when surfers were still proud users of the product.
The 90’s skate-shoe boom
But as uggs were on the rise, the early 90’s skate-shoe frenzy fractured the surf market, with surfers looking for shoe deals – and since skaters weren’t into boots, surfers had to look at skate brands for their coveted shoe deals. The skate-shoe was in, and the ugg was out.
Because of this fracture, Ugg Australia had to find a new audience – fast, inspiring them to drop an après ski and street version of the shoes. This is likely what we know the boots as today.
Image Credit: Aimee Kelly via Ugg Australia social.
Okay guys, I’ll admit it – the minis are sort’ve cute.
Unsurprisingly, once Ugg Australia was sold, the new owners ceased manufacturing in Australia to save money and went full corporate – sending desist letters to Australian-based makers selling their own versions.
Instead of conceding to the corporate Goliath, the Australian Sheepskin Association (ASA) was founded, ready to fight for the longstanding-Australian tradition (we love this for them). ASA argued the term ugg had been used nationally for sheepskin boots since the early 1900s.
In 2006, it was ruled that Australian makers could use the “Ugg” trademark in Australia only, where there are more than 70 trademarked uses of the term today.
So, next time your friends start talking about the return of the ugg trend today, be sure to let them know about the origins of the ugliest boots in the outback.
- TSH xx
If you’ve made it this far, thank you so much for reading my first volume of The Style Historian – I’d love to hear your thoughts and ideas for what you’d like to read next.
There were many helpful resources I used to put this together, they are listed below: