Everybody loves their lacquered red-soled chic Louboutins, right? But do you know the many unknown facts about the designer Christian Louboutin? Let’s tell you…
Louboutin was born and raised in Paris. He was the only son of Roger, a cabinet maker and Irene, a homemaker from Brittany. But he always wondered why he was much darker skinned than any of his siblings. In an interview, he spoke about how he felt he wasn’t French and thought his family had adopted him. But instead of feeling it was terrible and that he was an outsider, he invented his own history, full of characters from Egypt, because he was very into the pharaohs.
Later, he discovered that he had Egyptian heritage from his biological father, who had been in a secret relationship with his mother Irene, as revealed by one of his sisters in 2014.
Louboutin was expelled from school thrice and then he decided to run away from home at the age of 12, at which point his mother allowed him to move out to live at a friend’s house. He faced much opposition when he decided to drop out of school. However, he claims that what helped him make up his mind was an interview on TV with Sophia Loren, in which she introduced her sister. She stated that she had to leave school when she was only 12, but got her degree when she was 50. He later remarked, “Everybody applauded! And I thought, Well, at least if I regret it I’m going to be like the sister of Sophia Loren!”
Louboutin’s passion for designing shoes started at a young age, overshadowing his interest in academics and leading him towards a successful career in fashion.
His little formal training included drawing and the decorative arts at the Académie d’Art Roederer. Louboutin says his fascination with shoes began in 1976 when he visited the Musée national des Arts d’Afrique et d’Océanie on the avenue Daumesnil. It was there that he saw a sign from Africa forbidding women wearing sharp stilettos from entering a building for fear of damage to the extensive wood flooring. This image stayed in his mind, and he later used this idea in his designs. “I wanted to defy that”, Louboutin said. “I wanted to create something that broke rules and made women feel confident and empowered.”
Fascinated by world cultures, he ran away in his teens to Egypt and also spent a year in India. Louboutin returned to Paris in 1981, where he assembled a portfolio of drawings of elaborate high heels. He brought it to the top couture houses. The effort resulted in employment with Charles Jourdan. Subsequently, Louboutin met Roger Vivier, who claims to have invented the stiletto, or spiked-heel shoe. Louboutin became an apprentice in Vivier’s atelier.
Going on to serve as a freelance designer, Louboutin designed women’s shoes for Chanel, Yves Saint Laurent and Maud Frizon. In the late 1980s, he turned away from fashion to become a landscape gardener and to contribute to Vogue but missed working with shoes and set up his company in 1991.
With funds from two backers, he opened a Paris shoe salon in 1991 with Princess Caroline of Monaco as his first customer. She complimented the store one day when a fashion journalist was present, and the journalist’s subsequent publication of Princess’ comments helped greatly to increase Louboutin’s renown. Clients such as Diane von Fürstenberg and Catherine Deneuve followed. Later, those interested in his stiletto heels have included Christina Aguilera, Joan Collins, Jennifer Lopez, Madonna, Tina Turner, Marion Cotillard, Nicki Minaj, Gwyneth Paltrow and Blake Lively. Sarah Jessica Parker wore a pair of shoes by Louboutin for her wedding. Britney Spears wears a pair of high-heeled Louboutins in her music video “If U Seek Amy” which were not available for sale until a month after the video was released
Red-Soled High Heels
Louboutin helped bring stilettos back into fashion in the 1990s and 2000s, designing dozens of styles with heel heights of 120 mm (4.72 inches) and higher. The designer’s professed goal has been to “make a woman look sexy, beautiful, to make her legs look as long as [he] can”. While he does offer some lower-heeled styles, Louboutin is generally associated with dressier evening-wear designs incorporating jewelled straps, bows, feathers, patent leather, red soles and other similar decorative touches. He is most popularly known for the red leather soles on his high-heeled shoes.
Christian Louboutin’s red-bottom colour code is Pantone 18-1663 TPX.
His single biggest client is American novelist Danielle Steel, who is reputed to own over 6,000 pairs and is known to have purchased up to 80 pairs at a time when shopping at his stores.
