International shoe designer Olivia Morris injects fun into her glamorous creations. "Shoes can still be beautiful if they are light-hearted," Lord Killanin's eldest daughter tells Deirdre McQuillan.
Standing proud over the shops lining London's busy Portobello Road is a big pink neon stiletto marking the headquarters of Olivia Morris, queen of shoes. Her tongue-in-cheek attitude to sexy shoes started with nude leather and tattooed designs, but her latest collection is less quirky and more sophisticated.
If you love shoes, you have probably seen her collection in Brown Thomas (starting at about €400) and in Debenhams (a more affordable €80-€120). The current collection features intricate latticed sandals, in prints designed by Celia Birtwell, and sleek patent high-heels decorated with her signature ruffles.
As an international shoe designer, the 34-year-old has learned what women like: Russians and Italians love high heels, Hong Kong prefers kitten heels and London, well, London likes both high and flat, she tells me when we meet. The comment is an indication not just of international preferences but also of the reach of her growing customer base.
The studio where she works with an all-female team is small and bright, dominated by a handsome Perspex honeycomb display stand with a box for each pair of shoes. Stacks of black boxes containing the first samples of her winter 2008 collection remain closed. They have just arrived and she wants to open them by herself, in private.
One gorgeous arched black ankle boot, however, has been revealed. Composed of 80 pieces, it's a Victorian-style lace-up, exquisitely crafted in fine leather layers. Another elegant low-cut black satin stiletto shimmers with a glittering diamante disc. Her winter 2008 collection has a lot of nude and bright patents, but it's predominantly black, because the reality is that is what we all wear. Ideas for the collection were triggered by a visit to Berlin, an inspiring city, and a poem about shoes by Viki Baum called Berlin Hotel.
Morris has an intriguing family history that gave her the confidence to find a creative career. She is the eldest daughter of the film producer Redmond Morris, the present Lord Killanin, whose notable film credits include The Wind That Shakes the Barley, Michael Collins and The Butcher Boy. Her mother, Pauline Haughton, is an interior designer with a house in Morocco, where Morris has spent many happy times. And although she was born and reared in London she has strong links with Ireland, particularly Spiddal, in Co Galway, where she spent family holidays in her childhood.
Although her parents are now separated, Morris remains close to both and credits them with nurturing their children's artistic sides. Her brother Luke is a talented up-and-coming film-maker. These days her holidays are often a choice between Galway and Essaouira, in Morocco.
Morris's fascination with shoes began when, aged 14, she became conscious of having size-eight feet. Her education led her to Cordwainers College, in London, where she became one of the first to do its three-year shoemaking course. She graduated in 1997 and set up in business three years later. "The cobbling side
was amazing," she says. "In order to design well, you need to know how to make
shoes."
Her success was slow and steady - and, she admits, an expensive hobby until she moved her manufacturing to Italy, five seasons ago. This was the turning point. "I had been making shoes in London's East End and getting a major start with fashion designers such as Anthony Symonds and Tracey Boyd. Putting your shoes on the catwalk is a way of connecting them to what is something of a separate industry."
Her shoes are beautiful, if expensive. "I wanted to design shoes at middle price points, but it is impossible to do that because there is so much time in the development of the product. I start each collection with the heel and toe shapes, to create the silhouette, and if you are developing new patterns, that costs money."
She acknowledge younger women's craving for gorgeous shoes with her less expensive line for Faith. "It's a nice way to enter a different market and make young women more aware of my name."
A lot of her ideas, kept in a scrapbook, come from classic details such as broguing or pinked edges, and there's usually a dance element to the shapes. "I tend to look back at the seasons with a new eye. The post-war period and early 1950s was a time of liberation for women. They became more sexual, they wore high heels and a lot of designers find that fascinating." And, she might have added, women had the money to buy their own shoes for the first time.
Morris has acquired an extraordinary leather-bound album, kept from the 1940s to the 1960s by a Manchester collector obsessed with shoes. It features a newspaper item from 1944 headlined "The wedge heel is here to stay". Those decades interest her. "We look back because there is so much to be inspired by. I work hard on design and want to take it further, and I tend to look at past seasons with a new eye. It's important to keep things fresh." What sets her apart from other shoe designers is her sense of humour. "What's really important is that injection of fun, humour and light-heartedness. Shoes can still be beautiful if they are light-hearted. My style is a little more pared down now, more balanced and modern. It has grown up as I have grown up."
A passion for the 1950s is expressed not only in what she designs but also in what she chooses to have around her, such as beautiful Castiglioni lamps and an unusual brass leaf standard, items sourced from a local antique shop, Les Couilles du Chien. Her neon stiletto sign, however, was made specially. "I have always been mad about neon. My dad was passionate about the 1950s and rock'n'roll." Shiny patent has always featured in her collections.
Her business is expanding as her collection grows, and Morris travels twice a year to Bologna, in Italy, to the big leather fairs. She finds celebrity endorsement embarrassing, and is cynical about it, having grown up in the film business. Unlike some other shoe designers, she's not one to send out free boxes of shoes in the hope of celebrity endorsements. She once told a UK interviewer: "I appreciate my PR if it is a picture of my shoes, if it is about my work, if I am respected for what I do."
What does please her is being stocked in key stores such as Dover Street Market in London, 10 Corso Como in Milan and Jeffreys in New York. "From a personal point of view, it is going well in stores that we respect." And with that recognition, she will argue, like many others, that beautiful shoes make women feel beautiful. "Women have different bodies, but the nice thing about shoes is that anyone can wear a beautiful pair of shoes."
The Olivia Morris collection is sold in Shoe Studio at Brown Thomas. Solo with Olivia Morris by Faith is available at Debenhams; www.oliviamorrisshoes.com