ECCO GOLF’s three-woman design team has spent years reshaping what women want from golf footwear. With this year’s Street Vibe launch — and a recent collaboration with US brand Fore All — Helena, Eriko and Iben explain how they do it.
Golf shoes have always been built around performance. Grip, stability, waterproofing — the technical brief is well established. What has taken longer to arrive is a women’s golf shoe designed with the same seriousness applied to how it looks as how it performs. ECCO GOLF has been working on that problem for some time, and the team doing the work is entirely female.
Women Designing For Women
Helena, Eriko and Iben form the core of ECCO GOLF’s women’s footwear design team. Each brings a different discipline — footwear design, colour and material, and product development — and the three have worked in close collaboration across multiple collections. It is not a structure that came about by accident. When ECCO partnered with US golf and lifestyle brand Fore All on a limited collaboration last year, the decision was made to assemble an all-female team specifically to ensure the collection reflected what women actually want from a golf shoe.
Helena describes the appeal of that brief directly: “The opportunity to work on a feminine-powered project, by women for women, in a male-dominated sport was a fresh and appealing prospect.” Eriko’s focus was on colour and detail: “It was refreshing to translate Fore All’s playful design sensibilities into our golf shoes — working on concepts unique to a collaboration rather than an inline collection.” For Iben, the value lay in the external perspective: “Having input from external partners always challenges us to look at the products in new ways.”
What Women Want From a Golf Shoe
The question of what women golfers actually want from their footwear is one the team has thought about carefully. Performance is not negotiable — but it is no longer the whole answer. “I believe women golfers value not only the performance of their shoes but also the excitement of the colouring,” says Eriko. “With more options now available in women’s golf apparel, they want to enjoy fashion — so I aim to create colourways that work with their outfits.”
Iben points to a broader shift in how women use their golf shoes: “Many female golfers are looking for a shoe that fits into ECCO’s ethos of more than a game. It’s not just about results — it’s about the feeling of the game and everything around it.” That thinking is visible in the design of ECCO’s hybrid shoes, which are built to work across the full day rather than only on the course. Helena traces the moment that category changed: when Fred Couples wore ECCO’s hybrid golf shoes at the 2010 Masters, it announced to the wider golf world that a shoe could be both course-ready and wearable off it.
The thinking the team describes is visible in ECCO GOLF’s new SS26 release, the Street Vibe. Built on premium ECCO Performance Leather from the brand’s own tanneries, it uses ECCO-TEX waterproofing and FLUIDFORM™ Direct Comfort Technology — a construction process that bonds the upper and sole directly, without adhesive, for a more flexible and durable result. The outsole is based on the E-DTS™ NET design, a hybrid system that delivers traction on the fairway without looking out of place anywhere else.
For women, the Street Vibe comes in two versions: a lace-up and a slip-on with an elasticated collar. Both share the same low-profile silhouette and lightweight feel. Lydia Ko, who wears ECCO GOLF on tour, is among the players who have worn the shoe. The women’s price is £120, correct at time of writing.
Where Women’s Golf Footwear Is Heading
All three designers are consistent on where the category needs to go. “I hope to see more diversity in femininity within women’s golf,” says Eriko. “A variety of styles and more choices. Collaborations like this are definitely helping to push the boundaries of golf codes.”
Helena adds that a genuine focus on the female customer has a wider effect: “It helps to drive increased female participation in sport.” Iben is direct about what that means for design practice: “I hope every collaboration we do will question the status quo to ensure we keep improving.”
Browse the ECCO GOLF range in the Women & Golf Fashion Directory
