For centuries, lace was worth more than gold. Jimmy Choo’s latest stiletto nods to that history
Lace is usually perceived as something namby-pamby, delicate and fragile. It’s used for trimming nighties, not dressing knights. But these Jimmy Choo shoes craft lace with a completely different sensibility, transforming it into something tougher, spikier and altogether more dangerous. First of all, there’s the razor-sharp silhouette of this stiletto itself, its point sliced without any fuss or frill and pulled in tight against the foot. And the admittedly still dainty lace fabric of the shoe is tipped at the toe with a glistening cap of lace-worked gilded metal. There’s a throwback there, ironically, to the pragmatically protective steel toe caps of the boots of workmen and soldiers, designed to shield the toes from hard labour – a notion which itself originates in the pointed sabatons that defended the feet of warriors in their medieval plate armour, potentially a literal Achilles heel (or, rather, toe). There’s also, perhaps, an aesthetic nod to the rich and deep history of lace. For eons, hand-worked in small and often obscure communes such as Alençon and Valenciennes – places that effectively surrendered their names and reputations to the material – lace was so prized by the European aristocracy in the 16th and 17th centuries that, weight for weight, it was worth more than gold. Obviously, the cap on this shoe isn’t the real thing, but it creates much the same effect.
The Faiz 100 Jimmy Choo lace pumps with metal lace detail are available to buy now.
