Well Shod, Well Imformed

THE PROPORTIONALIST

It’s been some time (approx 12 months) since the Despotic Queen bumped heels with Jelske Peterson so yesterday on a whim I dropped in on the Dutch footwear designer. By the look of the mouth-watering delights she’s been serving up Imelda thinks’ it’s been 11 months and 30 days overdue.

After collaborating with Antoine Peters Spring Summer 08 collection, Peterson collaborated with Marga Weimans on the designer’s couture collection. According to Iconique, Weimans was ‘the only Dutch designer ever to finish the 4th Master Year of the prestigious Royal Antwerp Art Academy’ and is ‘the new promise in Couture’.

Peterson explained, “Marga's own inspiration for her wonderful, outrageous collection was Alice in Wonderland, and she wanted sort of ballerina shoes. She gave me some pictures of the kind of shoes she wanted and I did the rest (below). Shaping the last, the details in the shoes, all that stuff. We co-designed them going back and forth with advice and feedback.”

Asking her if she intended to collaborate with Weimans again, Peterson replied, “We did talk about a new collaboration right after the last one for her prêt-a-porter collection but we didn’t really make any decisions on that.”

Despite these prestigious collaborations Peterson continues to drift just below the fashion radar.

Given the 25 year old’s freakish talent for proportion, Imelda suspects the laid back Dutchwoman is timing her ascension, “I have had a year (since her graduate collection) to think about what I really want in the future - and that is to knock Louboutin of his throne”

Peterson EXCLUSIVELY revealed, “I’m close to getting my production line started! Somebody in Portugal is interested in producing and developing my shoes. It's probably going to take about another year”

Over the past 12 months Peterson has continued to handmake her shoes (and selling them in an Amsterdam atelier), subsequently she has built a steady and cultish following. However, with manufacturing comes a shift in focus and Peterson freely admitted it’s taken a toll on her output (for the atelier), “I am reducing the quantity though since I want more time for really getting started with my production”

Peterson revealed she plans to sell the first collection via a ‘guerilla store’. “It’s a sort of pop up/concept store” she revealed, “I can sell the shoes myself”. Proving that not only is she an extraordinary design talent, she’s market savvy.  Peterson explained her ‘guerilla store’ will allow her to connect with her customer and “see what kind of people are interested and what kind of reaction they get and build on from there”

Peterson has used her downtime honing her aesthetic, including several new heel shapes, an example of which being these burnt toffee colored wedges (above) and a line of men’s footwear (below), which according to Peterson “may or may not end up in her debut collection”.

The anime inspired stub toe Peterson used in her graduate collection (seen here) has been updated with a more austere and bewitching almond toe shape.  

“I will always be making high heeled shoes because high heeled shoes are the most beautifully shaped, erotically charged, loved by men and women, ever thought of things by human kind!” AMEN SISTA

Men’s footwear isn’t the only development the designer is remaining coy about. When the Despotic Queen questioned Peterson about the direction of her new collection she would only say “My inspiration for my new collection will be, as always, the female form, well balanced curves and volumes. I want my shoes to be so perfectly balanced that they are beautiful from every angle” 

Adding, “I want clothing to be the accessories to go with the shoes, not the other way around.”

WHAT? NO WOODEN CLOGS...

Imelda was so excited this morning I almost started talking in tongues! I was at the local church hall for my weekly liturgical dance class and was dancing for salvation when Immaculata (our movement instructor) genuflected too low and took a nasty looking tumble off the stage. Fortunately, a strategically placed baptismal font broke her fall, leaving her with a bruised ego and a soaked smock.

I’d be a liar-mouth if I said she didn’t have it coming, her righteous moves matched her stinking righteous attitude. Imelda should have been asked to choreograph the liturgical movement for All Saints Day - I’ve been taking ‘Jazz Ballet for Jesus’ for years - but I digress!

With the other ladies fussing I flicked the cassette player to radio and the Britney Aguillera song “What a girl wants” came pumping through the wireless and filled the hall. It got me thinking about want my Imeldettes would like in today’s post - and then I remembered Jelske Peterson.

The Dutch born designer was bought to the attention of The Despot after I saw Antoine Peters show at Amsterdam International Fashion Week. Jelske had collaborated with Antoine and designed some of the most beautifully proportioned footwear I’ve ever seen. Big open collars, clever strap detailing, colour blocking and contrasting inlays - and all before she graduated from Amsterdam’s ARTEZ SCHOOL OF ARTS.

We’d been in contact the day she graduated from design school but she wasn’t ready to debut her collection to the hungry masses. The Despot is more than a little impatient so I moved on to the next post, book marked her website and made a mental note (for a women of 79 this not wise) to follow up.

Racing home from the hall (I left Yum Yum to tidy up), I took a cursory glance at Jelske’s career defining debut collection and my despotic eye predicts a bright future.

Bordering on anime, the proportions of her stub-toe last are brilliantly balanced by sweeping throat lines that draw attention and celebrate parts of the foot normally covered. The two toned concave heel discombobulates the laws of proportion by creating the illusion of a stiletto heel. Any reference to the late 40’s work of André Perugia is obliterated by looking at the silhouette in profile, the proportions are stabilized by a ‘not quite’ demi wedge heel calling to mind early 90’s Westwood.

Now graduated, there is talk of her opening her first retail store in Amsterdam’s old red light district (coincidently, Susie Bubble posted something about new designers moving into the area). For the time being, should you be in Amsterdam picking up something medicinal for mummy Imelda, swing by and take a bow peep at the collection in its entirety and you’ll be guaranteed your own religious experience!