When Miranda Priestly click-clacked back into The Devil Wears Prada-verse for the sequel, fans never could've predicted Valentino Rockstuds would be her circa-2025 sidekick. One TikTok content creator called it a "diabolical move and not in a good way." Little did they know, The Devil Wears Prada 2 teaser played a pivotal role in reviving Valentino Rockstud pumps, 25 years after they already achieved world domination.
While Meryl Streep's red leather pair set off debates online, it simultaneously spiked interest. Searches for "Rockstud" on luxury reseller site Fashionphile have increased 180% since The Devil Wears Prada 2 teaser dropped in mid-November. Even before then, Jennifer Lopez, Nicole Scherzinger, and Anne Hathaway snuck Rockstuds onto 2025's street style scene. Now, they're one of several resurgent styles making a definitive comeback on the heels of other early and mid-aughts relaunches, like Chloë's Paddington Bag, Tory Burch Reva Flats, and Hervé Léger’s bandage dresses.
Love them or hate them, fashion girls would recognize those pyramid-shaped studs anywhere. Back in 2010, when Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pierpaolo Piccioli were co-creative directors at Valentino, they dressed nearly every Fall 2010 model in brand-new Valentino Rockstuds. The soon-to-be-signature motif trimmed T-strap ballet flats and stilettos aplenty.
Rockstuds only returned on the runway as an embellishment for purses, but that didn't matter. By 2014, the circa-Fall 2010 footwear version ruled the shoe racks of Emma Stone, Gigi Hadid, Reese Witherspoon, Dakota Fanning, Kourtney Kardashian, Eva Longoria, and even Fergie.
Valentino Rockstuds weren't just a celebrity staple; fashion insiders on the come-up wanted pairs, too. Before she was a personal shopper to the stars, then-government worker Gab Waller bought them with her first professional paycheck in 2015.
"I used to wear [the Rockstuds] everywhere," Waller tells Marie Claire. "When a consumer is purchasing luxury for the first time, they have [consistently] gone for the Rockstud, speaking from my own experience." According to Waller, they've always been an understated yet edgy way to say, "I'm a luxury shopper" without dousing yourself in a fashion house's monogram.
Some style commentators still associate Rockstuds with a specific moment in time—hence the reactions to their comeback in the Devil Wears Prada trailer. But Valentino has widely produced them since their launch. For that reason, Chloe King, director of fashion and lifestyle at Saks Fifth Avenue and Neiman Marcus, says they "exist outside the trend cycle."
"Modernized details continue to do what won over shoppers years ago: offering women a high impact, supremely versatile shoe that will take them from the office and out on the town," King adds.
A closer look at celebrity street style proves they've remained in rotation well into the 2020s. Jennifer Lopez styled her first Rockstuds in 2019; Dr. Jill Biden wore them at a Sept. 2020 presidential debate; Selena Gomez and Olivia Dean boarded the bandwagon in 2023; Lopez finally flaunted her second pair—red Rockstuds with slingback kitten heels—in 2025.
2025 was the biggest year for Rockstuds since 2013, largely thanks to The Devil Wears Prada 2 and now-creative director Alessandro Michele. That wasn't an accident. Valentino head of brand and product marketing Quoc-Anh Truong Cornette noted on LinkedIn the Rockstuds were deliberately placed in the trailer.
That bit of marketing-meets-movie magic proved successful in the end. One TikTok creator responded to Rockstud naysayers saying, "I am not falling for the anti-Valentino Rockstud propaganda." Another fan even splurged on a vintage pair because she suspected "they're on the verge of a major comeback."
By Dec. 2025, Michele debuted his take on Valentino Rockstuds in the Pre-Fall 2026 look book, placing the embellishment across ten new silhouettes. Waiting a few months into his tenure was a deliberate move. "I didn’t want to do this the day after I arrived here, because I found it weird and I didn’t know this territory so well," he told WWD.
By staying true to trademark Rockstud elements—including pointy toe boxes, ankle straps, and slim stilettos—Michele opened the shoes up to a nostalgia-driven generation of shoppers. "As newer generations discover cultural touchstones from the aughts, it makes perfect sense that the Rockstud would find an energized new following," King says.
Michele-era Rockstuds could very well share the same celebrity-beloved fate as their predecessors. One month after launch, the Pre-Fall 2026 stilettos flooded Michele's Spring 2026 Couture front row. Newly-minted Valentino ambassador Dakota Johnson arrived in a black, T-strap pair.
Tyla followed close behind Johnson at the Paris Haute Couture Week show in new Valentino Rockstuds. Her polka-dotted pair boasted yellow gold studs from heel to toe.
The Valentino Rockstud 2.0 has been public knowledge for three months, but Michele's version has yet to hit the market. (You'll need a personal shopper like Waller to track down a pair.) That said, it's unclear how shoppers will respond to new Rockstuds. Will Michele's take become as synonymous with his tenure as Chiuri and Piccioli's?
"Demand did decrease when Rockstuds were everywhere in the mid-2010s," Waller says. "I hope this time around they're [released] in more of a limited way, whether that's with colors or heel shapes to create the demand that's been lost over the years."
It seems she forecasted Valentino's plan: Not a single pair appeared in January's Couture lineup. Nevertheless, the clientele craves a full-on Rockstud renaissance. Ahead of the official relaunch, some shoppers are already buying the 26-year-old rendition once again.
