PARIS issue
aRUDE comment
ONLINE content
ARBITERS
Sexually Speaking Catherine M. interview by Iké Udé
State of Grace Stephen Greco Examines the Divine Jewels of JAR Paris
Choirmaster Chistophe Barratier interview by Brandon Judell
Make it Dada Delano Greenidge focuses on Marc Dachy's Points of Light
The Intoxicating Fumes of '70s Paris Madame de Baron Rigmor Trolle by Johan Falkman
BEAUTY
Beauty Illustrated photography by Wolfgang Ludes
A Girl's Best Friend photography by Kimio Takeyama
BON APPETIT
Questions for Eric Ripert
Questions for Christian Delouvrier
FASHION
Christian Louboutin's Moulin Rouge interview by Patrick McDonald
Enfant Terrible Foujita Photography by Makiko Takehara
The Only One Shoes of Olga Berluti interview by Iké Udé
Kiki of Montparnasse photography by Iké Udé
Chez Josephine Baker photography by Wolfgang Ludes
KULTURE & ART ART
Hardcore aRude interviews Orlan
I Love it Here 14 Questions for Henri Loyrette interview by Barbara Polla
KULTURE & ART CINEMA
Oh Yes Nicole Kidman interview by Brandon Judell
Frankly Yours Arnaud Desplechin interview by Brandon Judell
Like It Is Susan Sarandon interview by Brandon
Cover Her Face Laetitia Masson interview by Anh Duong
Look at Me Agnes Jaoui interview by Brandon Judell
LEGEND
As Young As You Feel Catherine Demeuve interview by Brandon Judell
Mothers and Sons aRUDE interviews Jean Claude Baker on his Mama Josephine
The Temptations of St. Jean Scot D. Ryersson and Michael Orlando Yaccarino Unearth Jean Lorrain
Black Prince of Elegance Charles Baudelariean an excerpt by Valerie Steele
OFF THE WALL GREEN IS OUR COLOR
Selima Salaun
Jean Chatelus
REVIEW
aRUDE Comment by Iké Udé
Telescope A close-up of the stars, notables, scenesters and picturesque dilettantes
ARCHITECTURE & DESIGN
Flora Painting by Henri Matisse
Winner Takes All Alex Ulam gets Vertical with Christian de Portzamparc
Dusted & Finessed Jean-Christophe Poggioli's Design for Living interview by Alex Ulam
Towel with Attitude D. Porthault's Secret Treasures by Alex Ulam
STYLE
Pardon Our Apparance photography by Iké Udé
Element of Style aRUDE's template for style
Style File erotic jewelry designer Betony Vernon
Style File costume corset designer Mr. Pearl
Fantasy & Simulacrum photography by Iké Udé
aRUDE comment
paris_issue_oberluti.php
ONLINE content
ARBITERS
Sexually Speaking Catherine M. interview by Iké Udé
State of Grace Stephen Greco Examines the Divine Jewels of JAR Paris
Choirmaster Chistophe Barratier interview by Brandon Judell
Make it Dada Delano Greenidge focuses on Marc Dachy's Points of Light
The Intoxicating Fumes of '70s Paris Madame de Baron Rigmor Trolle by Johan Falkman
BEAUTY
Beauty Illustrated photography by Wolfgang Ludes
A Girl's Best Friend photography by Kimio Takeyama
BON APPETIT
Questions for Eric Ripert
Questions for Christian Delouvrier
FASHION
Christian Louboutin's Moulin Rouge interview by Patrick McDonald
Enfant Terrible Foujita Photography by Makiko Takehara
The Only One Shoes of Olga Berluti interview by Iké Udé
Kiki of Montparnasse photography by Iké Udé
Chez Josephine Baker photography by Wolfgang Ludes
KULTURE & ART ART
Hardcore aRude interviews Orlan
I Love it Here 14 Questions for Henri Loyrette interview by Barbara Polla
KULTURE & ART CINEMA
Oh Yes Nicole Kidman interview by Brandon Judell
Frankly Yours Arnaud Desplechin interview by Brandon Judell
Like It Is Susan Sarandon interview by Brandon
Cover Her Face Laetitia Masson interview by Anh Duong
Look at Me Agnes Jaoui interview by Brandon Judell
LEGEND
As Young As You Feel Catherine Demeuve interview by Brandon Judell
Mothers and Sons aRUDE interviews Jean Claude Baker on his Mama Josephine
The Temptations of St. Jean Scot D. Ryersson and Michael Orlando Yaccarino Unearth Jean Lorrain
Black Prince of Elegance Charles Baudelariean an excerpt by Valerie Steele
OFF THE WALL GREEN IS OUR COLOR
Selima Salaun
Jean Chatelus
REVIEW
aRUDE Comment by Iké Udé
Telescope A close-up of the stars, notables, scenesters and picturesque dilettantes
ARCHITECTURE & DESIGN
Flora Painting by Henri Matisse
Winner Takes All Alex Ulam gets Vertical with Christian de Portzamparc
Dusted & Finessed Jean-Christophe Poggioli's Design for Living interview by Alex Ulam
Towel with Attitude D. Porthault's Secret Treasures by Alex Ulam
STYLE
Pardon Our Apparance photography by Iké Udé
Element of Style aRUDE's template for style
Style File erotic jewelry designer Betony Vernon
Style File costume corset designer Mr. Pearl
Fantasy & Simulacrum photography by Iké Udé
OLGA BERLUTI the only one
Iké Udé
Olga Berluti click image to enlarge Iké Udé: Are you often at the store?
Olga Berluti: For forty years I spent ten hours, seven days out of the week in the store and there was not a single customer I did not know. Now I don't often go there. The customers come and see me in the workshop, in my atelier.
IU: What is the difference between receiving clients at the boutique versus the atelier space in terms of engagement?
OB: There is obviously more affection coming here in the atelier. The customers I see are the same ones I saw years ago, who still come. I am very linked with them. I see their sons and their grandsons. There is more emotion. And I would imagine more intimacy.
IU: When did your leadership of Berluti start?
OB: I was 14. It's something that's really been in me; I've been living for this house since the beginning. It was more than trade. It was really a love relationship between me and my customers: Yves Saint Laurent, Andy Warhol, all these very famous actors that came in the store.
IU: Of all your Berluti predecessors, who are you the most fond of?
OB: Talbino, third generation. I loved his elegance, his act of measure, his madness—he was somewhere else. He was extravagant. He died in the '90s. When he died and you found yourself alone at the helm, were you nervous, or were you simply calm and confident? I am a peaceful person. I really believe in the spiritual part of people, the immortality of the soul. He never really left me. He is with us in this house. It's a continuity; there is no break.
IU: What was your first collection after Talbino passed away?
OB: The Club Collection. It was a continuity of the emblematic style of the house, but also what I saw from the customers. New customers coming in the store inspired it.
OB: A metaphor, an allegory, symbolism of a sort? It's really to pay tribute to all the customers who surrounded me when I started on my own. Who sustained me and stood next to me.
IU: How did the Tattoo Collection come about?
OB: I always work on what's happening around me. I love the skin as an aesthetic platform. I love living skin. I am the only woman cobbler in the world. I wanted to write my own story. I wrote my story working with scarification, the mask.
IU: Were there difficulties with tattooing on leather as opposed to human skin?
OB: Massive difficulties. I used a young guy who just graduated medical school to help me to find solutions. It was the skin that I needed to make alive again. It took four years to find a solution, so that the ink doesn't explode inside, that it circulates. The problem was the skin. Having found the solution, and being the first to do so, gave me tremendous satisfaction. When scientists take a long time to research a medicine, they get a copyright and a patent, and they charge so much money that most people cannot afford the medicine.
IU: After four years on Tattoo, you could have taken a pharmaceutical attitude and charged a high price tag.
OB: It's not like that. I do not measure or value my time at Berluti in terms of hours spent on this or that. I do not count time with Berluti. Everything is done from my heart and from my soul.
aRUDE: What is the Laso Collection about?
IU: I like embroidery, I like thread going through things. I love the garments of the cowboys. The Laso was inspired by the way cowboys move. I like the swagger. Hence, I made it dandy, very sophisticated, very elegant but wild. The colors are beautiful. You could exhibit them. I never thought of doing an exhibition. I use it as studies for my designs. It is a hobby for me.
IU: How would you compare and contrast the Ultima and Alodi Collections?
OB: Ultima is a passion. It was a pair of boots I did for Valentino and Greta Garbo to ski with. I wanted to build on this and transform it for the modern man today. It was first a temporary collection, but it became a grand classic. Alodi was the boot maker of the Pope, a famous boot maker in Italy. I was really admiring of his work, and he asked to see me before he died. He trusted me and gave me this shape he made in 1945 for an American soldier during the liberation of Italy. It was so balanced, so perfect. I didn't touch anything. I just invented the model of the shape. Were your predecessors not from Italy, Berluti as we know it would be quite different.
IU: Is there a kind of a hybridization of French and Italian sensibilities in your work?
OB: It is not a hybrid; it is unity itself. I'm inspired by the contact of international customers that come to Berluti. A boot maker does not invent. It is the exceptional customer that brings you the creativity. Was the Piercing Collection a cultural comment at all? It was the skin and the way you express yourself with it. The Piercing Collection was a language—something quite violent. That's why there is a violent shape to it. In terms of comfort, the Piercing Collection was the most difficult collection to build, due to the very violent and extravagant shape. Comfort to the wearer? Why is that? Because the line is very elongated, yet it couldn't be too long, otherwise it would break.
IU: You also have the Scarification Collection. Scarification involves pain in the process, shall we say?
OB: Is this collection then a symbolic analog to S I don't think about the pain part. It is cultural. It's the beauty of seeing something that has lived. The painter Lucino Fontana comes to mind. I love very much how he applied scarification on his canvases in a very elegant manner.
IU: What is the process for you—the secret, if you will?
OB: I love Fontana. The process is my invention and nobody else's. The scarification invokes something that has lived. I hate when it's all white or all black or all brown. I wanted to give the scarification collection the memory of a certain woman with the freshness of a young girl of fourteen. The patina evokes an erotic response, as well. Patina is a breathing work. And the patina is a result of applied essential oils. It's indelible. The technique can only be done by hand. It takes just as long for me to achieve a satisfactory patina as it is to make an entire pair of shoes.
IU: Do you care for women's shoes at all?
OB: When a woman loves her shoes as much as a man does and keeps them as long as a man, then I will consider it. You have to deserve your shoes. That is a very critically loaded statement. It conceals as much as it reveals. The difference is the link to fashion. A man's shoes can last from thirty to forty years with constant wear. Because of the dictates of fashion, a woman needs to keep changing her shoes very frequently. I am a feminist. I love women in all their differences, but I do not like shoes that are left in a cupboard.
IU: What is the next chapter in your adventure?
OB: New York. It's very important for me to come to New York because Americans enabled me to survive. What is your last word on cheap verses luxury shoes? The only thing that I hate in a cheap shoe is that it hurts. But if a low-quality shoe is perfectly conceived with respect to the man and his feet, and he wears it with arrogance, I'm okay with that. "Tight shoes are the greatest blessing, it makes one forget all their other problems," proclaims an adage. For me it's a stupid adage. You must never have sore feet. It's an unnecessary pain.
IU: What is the smallest shoe-size you've ever made for a client?
OB: The deceased Japanese Emperor. His size was very, very small. The largest was the French General, Charles de Gaulle. The size was not elegant. You can see in feet the architecture that stabilizes a man. Those particular architectures were as fascinating as that of the Pope. I have know artists who would love a Berluti shoe but cannot afford it. A lot of artists have fur coats, cashmere, etc. It's about one's value for something. A Berluti shoe is an investment. If you look after it well, it can last you a whole lifetime.
IU:What is the best care one can give to one's shoes?
OB: It's all about the quality of the choice more than the quality of the shoe. It's not the eye that chooses the shoe; it's the foot. If you have very fragile and bony feet, you need a subtle shoe. If you have a very thin ankle, you must have a mid-top, and don't wear a moccasin. The more the shoe is well chosen, whatever price you put on, the shoe it will last. With intelligence, a well-chosen shoe won't hurt, will never break and damage. It's your feet that damage.
IU:Should your clients take care of their shoes themselves or see a shoe shiner?
OB: We have done a film for that, which is called, A Lesson on Shoe Shining, for our customers. You can do better on your own, if you have the passion and the respect.
IU: Do you frankly think most of your clients will take care of their shoes themselves?
OB: Berluti customers? Yes. Even if they are very rich or very famous or even very beautiful.
Iké Udé
Olga Berluti click image to enlarge Iké Udé: Are you often at the store?
Olga Berluti: For forty years I spent ten hours, seven days out of the week in the store and there was not a single customer I did not know. Now I don't often go there. The customers come and see me in the workshop, in my atelier.
IU: What is the difference between receiving clients at the boutique versus the atelier space in terms of engagement?
OB: There is obviously more affection coming here in the atelier. The customers I see are the same ones I saw years ago, who still come. I am very linked with them. I see their sons and their grandsons. There is more emotion. And I would imagine more intimacy.
IU: When did your leadership of Berluti start?
OB: I was 14. It's something that's really been in me; I've been living for this house since the beginning. It was more than trade. It was really a love relationship between me and my customers: Yves Saint Laurent, Andy Warhol, all these very famous actors that came in the store.
IU: Of all your Berluti predecessors, who are you the most fond of?
OB: Talbino, third generation. I loved his elegance, his act of measure, his madness—he was somewhere else. He was extravagant. He died in the '90s. When he died and you found yourself alone at the helm, were you nervous, or were you simply calm and confident? I am a peaceful person. I really believe in the spiritual part of people, the immortality of the soul. He never really left me. He is with us in this house. It's a continuity; there is no break.
IU: What was your first collection after Talbino passed away?
OB: The Club Collection. It was a continuity of the emblematic style of the house, but also what I saw from the customers. New customers coming in the store inspired it.
When a woman loves her shoes as much as a man does and keeps them as long
as a man, then I will consider it. You have to deserve your shoes.
IU: What is the Club?
OB: A metaphor, an allegory, symbolism of a sort? It's really to pay tribute to all the customers who surrounded me when I started on my own. Who sustained me and stood next to me.
IU: How did the Tattoo Collection come about?
OB: I always work on what's happening around me. I love the skin as an aesthetic platform. I love living skin. I am the only woman cobbler in the world. I wanted to write my own story. I wrote my story working with scarification, the mask.
IU: Were there difficulties with tattooing on leather as opposed to human skin?
OB: Massive difficulties. I used a young guy who just graduated medical school to help me to find solutions. It was the skin that I needed to make alive again. It took four years to find a solution, so that the ink doesn't explode inside, that it circulates. The problem was the skin. Having found the solution, and being the first to do so, gave me tremendous satisfaction. When scientists take a long time to research a medicine, they get a copyright and a patent, and they charge so much money that most people cannot afford the medicine.
IU: After four years on Tattoo, you could have taken a pharmaceutical attitude and charged a high price tag.
OB: It's not like that. I do not measure or value my time at Berluti in terms of hours spent on this or that. I do not count time with Berluti. Everything is done from my heart and from my soul.
aRUDE: What is the Laso Collection about?
IU: I like embroidery, I like thread going through things. I love the garments of the cowboys. The Laso was inspired by the way cowboys move. I like the swagger. Hence, I made it dandy, very sophisticated, very elegant but wild. The colors are beautiful. You could exhibit them. I never thought of doing an exhibition. I use it as studies for my designs. It is a hobby for me.
IU: How would you compare and contrast the Ultima and Alodi Collections?
OB: Ultima is a passion. It was a pair of boots I did for Valentino and Greta Garbo to ski with. I wanted to build on this and transform it for the modern man today. It was first a temporary collection, but it became a grand classic. Alodi was the boot maker of the Pope, a famous boot maker in Italy. I was really admiring of his work, and he asked to see me before he died. He trusted me and gave me this shape he made in 1945 for an American soldier during the liberation of Italy. It was so balanced, so perfect. I didn't touch anything. I just invented the model of the shape. Were your predecessors not from Italy, Berluti as we know it would be quite different.
IU: Is there a kind of a hybridization of French and Italian sensibilities in your work?
OB: It is not a hybrid; it is unity itself. I'm inspired by the contact of international customers that come to Berluti. A boot maker does not invent. It is the exceptional customer that brings you the creativity. Was the Piercing Collection a cultural comment at all? It was the skin and the way you express yourself with it. The Piercing Collection was a language—something quite violent. That's why there is a violent shape to it. In terms of comfort, the Piercing Collection was the most difficult collection to build, due to the very violent and extravagant shape. Comfort to the wearer? Why is that? Because the line is very elongated, yet it couldn't be too long, otherwise it would break.
IU: You also have the Scarification Collection. Scarification involves pain in the process, shall we say?
OB: Is this collection then a symbolic analog to S I don't think about the pain part. It is cultural. It's the beauty of seeing something that has lived. The painter Lucino Fontana comes to mind. I love very much how he applied scarification on his canvases in a very elegant manner.
IU: What is the process for you—the secret, if you will?
OB: I love Fontana. The process is my invention and nobody else's. The scarification invokes something that has lived. I hate when it's all white or all black or all brown. I wanted to give the scarification collection the memory of a certain woman with the freshness of a young girl of fourteen. The patina evokes an erotic response, as well. Patina is a breathing work. And the patina is a result of applied essential oils. It's indelible. The technique can only be done by hand. It takes just as long for me to achieve a satisfactory patina as it is to make an entire pair of shoes.
IU: Do you care for women's shoes at all?
OB: When a woman loves her shoes as much as a man does and keeps them as long as a man, then I will consider it. You have to deserve your shoes. That is a very critically loaded statement. It conceals as much as it reveals. The difference is the link to fashion. A man's shoes can last from thirty to forty years with constant wear. Because of the dictates of fashion, a woman needs to keep changing her shoes very frequently. I am a feminist. I love women in all their differences, but I do not like shoes that are left in a cupboard.
IU: What is the next chapter in your adventure?
OB: New York. It's very important for me to come to New York because Americans enabled me to survive. What is your last word on cheap verses luxury shoes? The only thing that I hate in a cheap shoe is that it hurts. But if a low-quality shoe is perfectly conceived with respect to the man and his feet, and he wears it with arrogance, I'm okay with that. "Tight shoes are the greatest blessing, it makes one forget all their other problems," proclaims an adage. For me it's a stupid adage. You must never have sore feet. It's an unnecessary pain.
IU: What is the smallest shoe-size you've ever made for a client?
OB: The deceased Japanese Emperor. His size was very, very small. The largest was the French General, Charles de Gaulle. The size was not elegant. You can see in feet the architecture that stabilizes a man. Those particular architectures were as fascinating as that of the Pope. I have know artists who would love a Berluti shoe but cannot afford it. A lot of artists have fur coats, cashmere, etc. It's about one's value for something. A Berluti shoe is an investment. If you look after it well, it can last you a whole lifetime.
IU:What is the best care one can give to one's shoes?
OB: It's all about the quality of the choice more than the quality of the shoe. It's not the eye that chooses the shoe; it's the foot. If you have very fragile and bony feet, you need a subtle shoe. If you have a very thin ankle, you must have a mid-top, and don't wear a moccasin. The more the shoe is well chosen, whatever price you put on, the shoe it will last. With intelligence, a well-chosen shoe won't hurt, will never break and damage. It's your feet that damage.
IU:Should your clients take care of their shoes themselves or see a shoe shiner?
OB: We have done a film for that, which is called, A Lesson on Shoe Shining, for our customers. You can do better on your own, if you have the passion and the respect.
IU: Do you frankly think most of your clients will take care of their shoes themselves?
OB: Berluti customers? Yes. Even if they are very rich or very famous or even very beautiful.
