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Virgin America First Class shoes sport Wi-Fi, seatbelt buckles

Let your toes lounge in the lap of luxury with a pair of Virgin America shoes designed to evoke the first-class flying experience.

Amanda Kooser
Freelance writer Amanda C. Kooser covers gadgets and tech news with a twist for CNET. When not wallowing in weird gear and iPad apps for cats, she can be found tinkering with her 1956 DeSoto.
Amanda Kooser
Virgin America shoes
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Virgin America shoes

Feet the friendly skies.

Virgin America

If you thought Nike's self-lacing "Back to the Future" Air Mags were hard to find, meet the much more elusive Virgin America First Class shoes. There's only one pair in existence and they're only available through an eBay charity auction.

The shoes attempt to replicate the feel of flying first class on a Virgin America plane. The high-tech kicks are made from Italian white leather with a stainless steel seat buckle around the ankle. A rechargeable battery powers built-in mood lighting, a USB phone charger, a video display and a Wi-Fi-enabled hotspot (data plan not included).

The shoes are a collaboration between Virgin America, marketing agency Eleven and SearchnDesign. There's no size listed for them, because size doesn't matter here. They'll ship in an LED-lit Plexiglas display case, and you'll want to show them off, not scuff them up.

The auction listing describes the sneakers as "historic aviation memorabilia." The shoes are currently up to $1,300 (£1,070, AU$1,700) with nine days left to run. They only ship to the US, so international fans of bizarre footwear are out of luck. Proceeds from the sale go to Soles4Souls, a nonprofit organization dedicated to collecting and distributing shoes and clothes to people in need.