A precursor to luxury ready-to-wear shoes as well as designer of the first laced pump, Berluti has been shining around the world with its shoes for more than 100 years. Made almost exclusively in “Venezia” leather, reputed for its flexibility and aptitude for colors, each of their shoes is handmade in the brand’s workshops. Whether a ready-to-wear or custom made model, the customer always first adopts a “nude” model, devoid of patina and color. Berluti has set itself aside from its competitors by proposing incomparable footwear, who’s avant-garde shapes are considered to be works of art. This is how Berluti transformed the shoe into a veritable living piece of artwork that reveals its true identity with time, or the identity of the one who wears it. This moccasin’s carnal dimensions reveal themselves to be an extension of their owner.
In 1962, Andy Warhol climbed the steps of a boutique on 26 rue de Marbeuf in Paris before ordering a pair of moccasins that he himself had designed. Still unknown to the larger public, he imagined a pair of classic moccasins with a square toe. The Pope of Pop Art had barely left his sketch at the boutique before heading out without leaving a down payment. Talbinio Berluti, then creative director for the brand, threw the sketch away before Olga Berluti, a simple apprentice, managed to get ahold of it. Against her family’s will, she made the shoes herself with salvaged leather scraps. Legend has it that it was already too late when she noticed that there was a giant vein marring the leather she had chosen on one of the two plateaus. Since this would have normally been a fatal flaw, she explained to the future Pope of Pop Art that the leather she used had come from an abused cow that had been rubbed up against one too many wires. These moccasins, very modern for the era, were Olga’s first creation, and Warhol literally fell for their charm. An icon was born.
The first female shoemaker in the world, Olga Berluti would revolutionize the field as well as shoes themselves.Today, the Andy moccasin remains the Parisian shoemaker’s most iconic model. In 2012, for the model’s 50th birthday, the brand launched a special collection paying homage to its years of existence as well as the ones that imagined it. The collection was full of bright colors like kelvin blue, bottle green, and even cherry red as well as adornments in crocodile and Venezia leather. Rich in history as well as notoriety, the Andy moccasins will always remain the most precious as well as the most envied moccasins in the world.
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