Roger Vivier

Born in 1907, Roger Vivier has been called the Fabergé of Footwear for his extravagant, richly decorated shoes that he described as sculptures. Vivier sketched his first shoe design in 1917 when he was just ten years old, impressing a family friend who owned a shoe factory. Years later at the École des Beaux-Arts while studying sculpture, an apprenticeship manufacturing shoes introduced him to professional shoe design and production, and soon  he was designing shoes for a number of leading companies, including Bally and Delman. Fascinated by the world of theatre and music halls, Vivier designed some stage decors. Backstage, he met Josephine Baker and Mistinguett, for whom he created custom-made shoes.

After opening his own house in Paris in 1937, he continued to produce designs for Delman, maintaining a strong relationship that would last through 1962. Many of his designs of the 1930s and '40s were very sculptural and creative interpretations of the era's platform soles, which often included the wedge heels that had been introduced by Ferragamo in 1937. The first couturier to use Vivier footwear was Schiaparelli in 1937, who accepted a pair of Chinese-influenced platforms that Delman had rejected.

 Perugia was the most prominent shoe designer with couturiers at the time, but after Christian Dior switched from them to Delman in the early 1950's, Vivier's work for Dior through Delman cemented his reputation as the most innovative and influential shoe designer in fashion. 

He was a true leader in the evolution of footwear. Innovative creations from the first half of the decade included pumps incorporating transparent plastic in 1951 (a precursor to his more extensive use of transparent plastic in the mid-1960s) stilettos with the top of the heel inset from the back of the foot bed in 1953, and high heels with interchangeable sphere tips to coordinate with different outfits and accessories. 

From the New York Times in 1955 : 

"Finishing flourishes for opulent evening fashions are the new, exotic dancing slippers. Like drawings from Oriental picture books, these imaginative shoes display intricate patterns, shocking colors and dramatic lines.

Much talked about in the Paris collection of Christian Dior were the “fantasy” slippers covered in rich Oriental brocades. Designed by Roger Vivier, who also creates for Delman, these enchanting shoes resembled court pumps and had small, narrow Louis XV heels.

Right out of a fairy tale were the Dior shoes with sparkling jewelled balls on the tips of slender evening heels. These orna- ments are detachable, so that various colors can be substituted to complement the color of a dress or match the jewels worn with an evening ensemble. A fantastic story about these fan- tastic shoes was that one of M. Dior's private customers had ordered diamond spheres for her evening heels."

Vivier designed shoes under contract with the house of Christian Dior from 1953 to 1963. The two designers worked very closely together, with Dior sometimes conceiving of ensembles based on Vivier's footwear. Delman had been the springboard for this collaboration and Vivier shoes from this period usually contain the label Delman-Dior or Dior-Delman. 

In 1954, he created what we now think of as the modern stiletto heel. The very thin high heels, were invented in the late 19th century, but Vivier is known for reviving and developing this opulent style by using a thin rod of steel, carrying further similar uses of metal for heels undertaken by other designers during the early fifties, including Perugia, who produced sliver-thin metal heels as early as 1951. The same internal girding supported Vivier's Aiguille (needle) heels and Choc (shock) heels of 1955. In addition to the stiletto, he also experimented with other shapes, including the Comma “virgule”.  

In 1956 Rumour had it that Roger Vivier was instigating the demise of the heel. Steadfast in embracing the turning decade’s ideals of speed and freedom, he announced that his woman of winter would be ‘as bold and wilful as an Amazon by day, and as feminine and feline as a cat by night’. The low block heel with a large geometric chrome buckle was a seen as an audacious new design. Premiered alongside Yves Saint Laurent’s Mondrian collection, the shoe introduced a radical vision of elegance - one where women could claim the city with assured steps. 

They harmonised perfectly with the longer skirts in Dior's fall collection and were worn by Catherine Deneuve in Belle de Jour, the film in which the iconic heels made their first appearance. By December 1965, Vogue France was reporting that Roger Vivier had been overwhelmed by the success of his ‘chaussures à boucles d’argent’, and one now had to join a waiting list. Dubbed the ‘pilgrim-buckle shoe’ by the American press, the design would come to be known as the Belle Vivier after Catherine wore it. Asked later about her choice, Deneuve offered a simple explanation: ‘I wanted heels that weren’t too high.’

His expertly sculpted, delicate-looking silhouettes were intended to give a slight impression of height even though very low. When Dior raised his skirts to the knee, Vivier continued with low heels, they would remain his major focus through the 1960s.

The squared-off toe tip he introduced was made on a shoe last named the Mandolin - he also produced a cleft-toed variant he named Guitar. Fashion writers sometimes referred to these as chisel toes, though they wouldn't become mainstream until 1961. He also produced other unusual styles, including a toe tip with the top of the end concave for a scooped-out effect, as well as a pump where the outer side of the toe box was geometrically shaped into a flat plane.

In the early sixties, he began experimenting with wider, rounded toes, wedges and thicker low heels influencing the era's footwear trends. He introduced the Twist heel in 1962 and the Hurricane heel in 1963, the former a heel that looked wide from the back but narrow from the side, the latter a variation of his late-fifties Comma or Parenthesis heel. Vivier and Delman's partnership lasted until in 1962, capping off over a quarter-century of collaboration that had begun when Vivier first graduated.

Known for his work with Yves Saint Laurent, which he seemed to find uniquely inspiring, he also designed for a number of other houses, sometimes eight or nine in a season. These included Pierre Balmain, Guy Laroche, Nina Ricci, Ungaro, Simonetta e Fabiani, and Jacques Tiffeau. Though he had ended his official contract with Dior in 1963, Vivier still made shoes for Marc Bohan of Dior off and on throughout the decade.

A low-heeled, round-toed, patent leather pump with a square buckle was a best seller for him in 1964 and it would be modified slightly for Yves Saint Laurent's 1965 Mondrian collection, an iconic association that would cement it as a fashion staple - variations of which which are still championed today.

In 1966, the year that Space Age influence peaked in fashion, he would focus on futuristic low-heeled, round-toed shoes and boots in transparent plastic. For fall of 1962, many designers showed a range of boots up to knee height, and the following year some boots stretched to the thigh. The most famous of these were the low-heeled, thigh-high boots Vivier produced for Yves Saint Laurent's fall 1963 collection in materials from leathers to satin, particularly a much-photographed pair in black crocodile worn with a Space Age-looking outfit. The thigh-high boots he produced for various designers inspired by a pair Vivier had made for a Rudolf Nureyev performance of Swan Lake became iconic. Vivier also contributed astute versions of the low-heeled calf-high go-go boots. In the 1960s, Vivier also designed silk satin knee-high boots outlined in jewels, and thigh-high evening boots in a black elastic knit with beads. He continued to experiment, from the thigh-high stretch and Courrèges-like calf boots for Ungaro in 1967 to the waist-high boot-trousers for Simonetta e Fabiani in 1964.

After showing an occasional thickened sole earlier in the decade,  he debuted complete lines of platform shoes, including in two collections for Saint Laurent, launching a trend that would become characteristic of the 1970s. He also resumed his interest in high heels, with new shapes flared from top to bottom, simultaneously looking thick and giving an impression of greater height. At this time he created an African inspired collection for Saint Laurent, with versions of the period's flat, strapped-up-the-leg sandals with masks strapped to the front. 

In 1970 he also added a line of men's shoes. As the fashion world moved away from haute couture and toward ready-to-wear, he too adjusted, ceasing to provide made-to-order couture services in 1970 and concentrating only on his ready-made lines. He continued with thick heels, platforms, and boots, coordinating his proportions with the new midi skirts and hot pants. 

In the late seventies, Vivier retreated to his home in Périgord, eventually withdrawing almost entirely and working on sculpture while continuing to sketch shoe ideas. 

A series of Vivier retrospectives in 1980 signalled renewed interest in his work. The era saw a revival of styles from past decades and Vivier was inspired to create new work and update older signature styles like comma heels, ball-tipped heels, thigh boots, and shin-mask sandals. Major museums displayed landmark Vivier designs from their permanent collections, exhibitions were held in various cities. A new Vivier boutique opened in New York, his offerings once again available in both ready-to-wear and made-to-order form.

Grace Kelly, Ava Gardner, Gloria Guinness, Régine Zylberberg, and The Beatles were all Vivier customers, as well as Jackie Kennedy, Grace Kelly, the Duchess of Windsor, Princess Soraya of Iran, Marlene Dietrich, Elizabeth Taylor, Brigitte Bardot and, of course, Catherine Deneuve. He designed shoes for Josephine Baker and Queen Elizabeth II for her Coronation in 1953. He also occasionally designed for the stage, providing footwear for the dancers Rudolf Nureyev and Zizi Jeanmaire.

Roger died in 1998, age 90, of natural causes while asleep at his home in Toulouse. He leaves behind a legacy of innovation and inspiration in footwear design unlike any other.