Manolo Blahnik: "There is nothing charming about a woman who can not walk in his shoes"
The thing immense satisfaction about Manolo Blahnik, man, that just as you think. The singleminded obsession of fashion Anna Wintour is endowed with beautiful époque bonkersness Ab Fab Patsy and is located in the body of Hercule Poirot. It is lush and polish exaggerated formality - a bit like her shoes - both in his dress (double-breasted suit, bow) and its possibilities. He insists on treating Cartner-Morley me, with a Spanish accent flowers, which was decidedly more bizarre than sweet after 40 years in the UK.
Blahnik is the winner of this year - and we are only today, by the way, ta-dah! - The Outstanding Achievement gong at the British Fashion Awards. Manolo, one day before his 70th Birthday, when he collected his trophy on the 27th at the Savoy November get is already a Commander of the British Empire (awarded in 2007). And - better than any trophy - it is a household name since Carrie Bradshaw was pleaded with a mugger Manhattan: "You can take my Fendi take baguette, you can take my ring and my clock, but please not my Manolo Blahniks." Yet the man himself, who is now the phone for me to Italy, where he is to attend one of his works, the fact that "the perception of success or failure. I look forward and think about the challenges, because it is what drives me going. When I look back, I can see the feeling fear, not happy because my life is a bit of a mystery to me. "
In fact, I know what he means. It is strange to think, now, that was a time not so long ago when shoes were just shoes, instead of magic totems success and femininity they were. Expensive high heels have stuff into a pattern in our popular culture items for women. Olympians as they are rewarding success, and the default key combination for each book cover chick-lit. And the origin of the idea of ??the shoe as a magical object due to a large extent, such as Manolo creations. His sketches of shoes are extraordinary drawings not lifeless, but portraits of sensual and stimulating. Richard Avedon fashion photography showed us how clothing can lend his charisma and attitude to the user, and solve a focus on posture and form. Manolo did the same with shoes. With his sketches, Manolo has to be done more to open the world's eyes on the transforming power of the right shoe that someone as Cinderella.
Yet Manolo has never really benefited from this phenomenon has helped to create. He never sold his company. He personally designs every pair of shoes that bear his name, rather than delegate to a studio. The main roles of the company are held by members of his family, and he never made a lucrative mass market collaboration, such as Jimmy Choo for H & M. It's a rich man with a mode enviable life, but perhaps not so insanely rich, as one would expect could. He lives in Bath, a city built in the 18th Century, which he loves, he says, he settled in the 1980s, because he "could not afford" such a house in London. "But who cares? I could not be less business," he said cheerfully.Manolo in Santa Cruz de la Palma in the Canary Islands in 1942, a Czech father and a Spanish mother live comfortably on a banana plantation was born. He painted a rosy picture of his childhood. "My mother was exquisite She was born on an island, if it is not affected by the outside world, but it was what I call a natural, since the taste and she loved books in English, and we read every night - Oliver .. Twist, Little Dorrit, Enid Blyton. My father always on radio Casablanca, Arabic music was wonderful, and maids sing Andalusian popular songs. Englishness and also Spanish and African influences, all of which are important to me today. "
In his late teens, he was in Geneva, where (brilliantly incongruous image), he spent a summer internship at the United Nations to study. He escaped to Paris, arrived in London in 1968, and immediately fell in love with England - England especially at that time, whose name (Cecil Beaton, David Bailey, Anjelica Huston) Stud call her, like cloves in an orange color gives a modern world, we feel we feel he is boring in comparison. Driven by Diana Vreeland, then editor of American Vogue, which marked a sketch ankles intertwined with ivy and cherries in a portfolio of fashion designs and stage design, he began the manufacture of shoes. In 1971, he worked for Ossie Clark in 1973, it was learned at raves Womenswear Daily.He the profession of a shoemaker by careful study in the best studios. I reminded him of something he said he did not have formal training, because he had good taste. "Oh, that demanding things they say, I hope I was young! But in fact I have to try. And that's important."
Just like a delicate spring hides a steel cylinder, there is a stubbornness inside Manolo. He never changed his aesthetic, making shoes with a thin sole, even if the dominant mode is a broad platform. "I hate platforms," ??he said dryly. "The girl is a little chubby, or something else, she thinks platforms make it look bigger. But no, they make it look weird." This singularity of vision that the brand has drift in and out of fashion, but in recent years it had been on a good note. (Remember: When Kate Moss got married, she wore Manolos.) It also invests a great effort to ensure that your shoes are comfortable, and spends about three months every year visiting its factories. "I like an exaggeration, and I like quirky, but you need to be comfortable. Otherwise, it's nonsense. Nothing charm of a woman who can not walk in his shoes."
Anyone who thinks he looks charming, I ask - which means, in my opinion shallow which celebrity. "Do you know who I think looks fantastic? Bath in, there's always a woman to me. Twinsets you wearing, and usually a pleated tweed skirt. Not very expensive, but good quality and still looks perfect. For me This is fabulous. "