Rihanna isn't your average Parisian tourist. She views French-girl fashion as merely a suggestion, not a rulebook. For a trip to the City of Light on April 21, she leaned into Parisian styling ever-so-slightly, offsetting her favorite leggings with a lace-up Alaïa It-shoe.
Rihanna needed an outfit that would withstand an entire six-hour reservation at César, so she went with the classics. First up? An oversize bomber jacket in light-gray canvas. Next, the Grammy winner made a case for spring fur with a slim black stole, draped below her shoulders and across her torso. Much like the chic cardigan or the high-vamp flats she's worn with leggings earlier this year, the stole elevated her split-hem leggings in an instant. Each pant-leg's slit flaunted the true star of Rihanna's outfit: her lace-up pumps.
It seems Rihanna is still in the trial run phase of finding the perfect shoes to style with leggings. So far she's sampled animal-print pumps and the high-vamp flats trend with Amina Muaddi and Phoebe Philo selects. Judging by the strawberry-red Alaïa heels she click-clacked through Paris in, stilettos are now taking the lead.
Always down for a statement shoe, the "Stay" singer got her hands on pointy, lace-up pumps seen during the Spring 2026 runway show. (You may recognize their V-shaped vamps from the 2025 CFDA Fashion Awards, where Rihanna wore head-to-toe Alaïa.)
It's true: Rihanna doesn't only wear laces on Puma sneakers. She's religiously tied shoestrings up her legs since at least 2013, including at the 2017 Met Gala. (Dsquared even nicknamed the red, thigh-high pair the "RiRi Sandal" after her Met step-and-repeat.) What's more, RiRi's Fenty collaborations with Puma, Amina Muaddi, and even Manolo Blahnik debuted similar lace-up footwear. The VIP has quietly dominated the lace-up shoe sector for over a decade. We were just too captivated by her Puma sneakers to notice.
Black swan-esque laces weren't the Alaïa heels' only fierce feature. Zoom in to see the toebox-to-heel snakeskin texture. Not only did they help Rihanna get her lace-up footwear fix, they kept her animal-print series strong for another season.
Would a French local style leggings with lace-up pumps like Rihanna? Based on everything we know about the city's It-girl crowd, maybe not. But for the singer, it couldn't have been more on-brand.
