The maison’s CEO outlines the future of the brand

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Interview: Kristina Blahnik on the Ethos Behind Manolo Blahnik Menswear

The maison’s CEO outlines the future of the brand

Mike Tommasiello

23 June 2023

When people hear the name Manolo Blahnik, they often think of the iconic high heels immortalized by Carrie Bradshaw on Sex and the City (and, of course, And Just Like That). However, there’s far more to the brand’s global reputation and continuously pioneering collections. We recently sat down in Accord, New York’s INNESS to discuss the brand’s past, present and future with Kristina Blahnik, who not only serves as the maison’s CEO but is also the niece of brand founder Manuel “Manolo” Blahnik Rodríguez himself.

Can you tell us a little bit about the history of Manolo Blahnik menswear?

Actually, it’s a longer history than the women’s history of Manolo Blahnik because he started with menswear. He told me one of his first shoes was a shoe called the Hockney, which was a lace-up Derby with a very, very thick cream rubber crepe sole. I’ve seen pictures of it. Then he did boots in it. Then he did his first women’s shoe in crepe as well—but it was inspired from the Hockney shoe.

His attention was pulled toward womenswear because he was able to be more creative, wider; it was unboundaried. I think the boundaries of menswear tightened for a certain number of decades and they’ve widened again. I think now menswear can be anything. It can be colorful in some instances, it can be high heels, it can be platforms, it can be lace-ups, it can be slippers, it can be ballerinas.

You have dedicated menswear stores, as well?

In 2018 we decided we wanted to open our first dedicated men’s store, next to our women’s store in Burlington Arcade in London. And that’s when we really looked at our men’s collection and our archives and really took it all apart and rebuilt it for the modern man. Then we opened stores in Japan and in Paris. But the iconic space for us is our Madison Avenue store. When we were looking for space, we were introduced to 717 Madison Avenue and I stepped back, I went to the other side of the road and said, “this building is magnificent.”

How would you say the brand has evolved since to fit the modern day consumers? Has the design or the aesthetic remained classic?

I think we’ve really carefully looked at our passions. There is an element of classic. Manolo [himself] is a very classic tailored man, but equally, he’s a classic tailored man who will wear a lavender suit. It’s about being slightly unconventional and uncompromising and sticking to what really matters, which is comfort and quality.

I think at this point now, what you want is something you can put your foot in immediately and walk out of a store or walk out of wherever you are and go, “I’m happy, I’m comfortable. I don’t need to worry about that part of my body, but if I do look down, I’m going to be happy about it.” I think our view on that is if you put a bit of color in there, which is Manolo’s passion every season, that’s where we set ourselves apart from your more traditional brands.

Where do you draw inspiration from with the bright colors and the patterns?

My uncle starts with a really intellectual base. That can be a collage, with all sorts of reference points disparate to the point where you’re going. I don’t understand the connection between them. It can be Babylon meets Gore Vidal—you can’t even bring those two things together! But he has this amazing ability to bridge two disparate elements and bring them together and create a whole new aesthetic. When I started joining the family business, I asked him, “what is your personal motto?” And he said in Italian to me “Without tradition, we are nothing.” And then his own take on it was “but with fantasy we are free.” This was a quote that he was given by Luchino Visconti in a dinner that he was at with Anna Piaggi in 1971.

I think that’s a really important point about who we are and what we always strive to be: we’re not trying to be fashion. We’re trying to be something that is relevant to the past, present and future without being transient.

We see ourselves as a timeless investment brand. I personally don’t want to acquire something for the sake of acquiring it for that moment in time and then discarding it because it wasn’t a considered choice. I want us to be able to offer something to someone that in 10, 15, 20 years time is still relevant to them and their wardrobe. We heavily invest in what we do because, as I’m a previous architect, I believe the more energy you put into something like building a cathedral that took a hundred years time, it’s more likely to be standing in a thousand years than something that took a week to build and is probably not as stable.

What would you say to somebody who is looking to get their first pair of Manolos?

I would say be curious and be ready to be challenged in terms of “can we make you smile?” Because there’s no point in getting anything ever unless it genuinely makes you smile.

It’s extraordinary in that sense that you offer so many options for so many personalities that you can choose. 

What you have now is a bit of renaissance toward classicism and traditional footwear, because everyone has a lot of sneakers. But Anything goes now. You can mix anything with everything. And this is what I find really interesting because your ability to create your own identity is much wider now than it ever was. You don’t have to subscribe to the suit, tie and Oxfords.
That doesn’t exist anymore. Those rules have been rewritten because it’s more about individuality and having style. That style doesn’t require a certain set of criteria or rules.

Our best-selling colors are pink and electric blue. It’s not brown, it’s not black. It’s not gray. That is what the people that come to us are looking for.

Anything new we can expect coming up?

More color, no surprises. More places where you can find men’s shoes. More storytelling, more fun moments, because that’s really what we’re about.

Images courtesy of Brett Warren

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Food + Drink

Chef Brian VanderGast’s “Lemon: A Rooftop Experience Inspired by Krug” at The Ned Nomad

David Graver

23 June 2023

Following the success of last year’s “Single Ingredient” pairing menu series—which starred rice as the key culinary component—Krug’s consumer-facing dinner explorations are continuing this season, at NYC’s The Ned Nomad, with lemons as the counterpoint to the beloved champagne. Featuring Krug Grande Cuvée 171st Édition and Krug Rosé 27th Édition, the spectacular dining experience has been imagined by The Ned’s executive chef, Brian VanderGast, who artful aligns zesty, citric flavors with the maison’s signature aromas, flavors and effervescence. Entitled “Lemon: A Rooftop Experience Inspired by Krug,” the event series is only one facet of the multi-chef Krug x Lemon chronicle, which even includes the cookbook The Zest is Yet to Come. Read more about the event at OpenTable.

Image courtesy of Krug

This week four volunteers moved into Mars Dune Alpha, NASA’s 3D-printed habitat designed by BIG. Created for NASA’s CHAPEA (Crew Health and Performance Exploration Analog) program, the 1,700-square-foot structure is what NASA envisions being able to print on the Red Planet.

Mars Dune Alpha is located at the Johnson Space Center in Houston. The four non-astronaut volunteers, two male and two female, consist of a research scientist, an engineer, a science officer and a medical officer. They’re meant to spend one year living and working inside the structure to evaluate its feasibility:

Researchers will simulate the challenges of a human mission to Mars, including resource limitations, equipment failure, communication delays, and other environmental stressors.

“The simulation will allow us to collect cognitive and physical performance data to give us more insight into the potential impacts of long-duration missions to Mars on crew health and performance,” said Grace Douglas, CHAPEA principal investigator. “Ultimately, this information will help NASA make informed decisions to design and plan for a successful human mission to Mars.”

While the renders for the interior look like this…

…thus far the only image of the actual interior available at press time looked like this:

Seems odd that the person on the left gets an easy chair, and the person on the right gets a desk. I wonder if they’re meant to compete for rewards, like in a reality show.

Mars Dune Alpha was 3D-printed by Icon, who also collaborated with BIG on a residential 3D-printed neighborhood in Austin, Texas.

A sports network has borrowed a digital fabrication trick from the toy design world.

Nowadays you can order popular action figures with your own 3D-printed head on it, courtesy of a collaboration between Hasbro and Formlabs. The Fox Sports network, who will be broadcasting the upcoming Women’s World Cup, took notice; facial scanning and 3D printing mean you no longer have to hire a talented sculptor to reproduce someone’s likeness, nor wait months or years for them to complete it. Thus the network commissioned a partially digitally-fabricated statue of Alex Morgan, the USWNT’s star forward, to promote the tournament.

Concept art. Image: Fox Sports

Rather than sitting for long sessions with a sculptor, Morgan participated in a photo shoot wearing the U.S. flag and hoisting the WWC trophy. (Morgan and the USWNT won the last two events, in 2019 and 2015.) A team of artists and digital fabricators then created a 20-foot statue, made primarily of reinforced foam and painted with a hardcoat, and featuring a 3D-printed likeness of Morgan’s head using data captured at the photo shoot. The trophy was also 3D-printed.

Image: Fox Sports

Fox Sports is sending the statue, crowned “Liberty Alex,” on a U.S. tour to promote their WWC coverage. The statue will then come to rest at Fox Square in New York City prior to the July 20th start of the tournament, which takes place in Australia and New Zealand.

Image: Fox Sports

Given that photo shoots are typically easier than sitting for sculpting sessions, you can bet we’ll be seeing more statues of famous figures with 3D-printed heads in the future.

Industrial design was born in the 20th century, and the approach has been “Design a product that solves a problem.”

The 21st century approach: “Design a system that solves a problem.”

A startup called Mill is taking the 21st century approach to solve the problem of food waste. Their eponymous product, which looks like a waste bin, is in fact part of a system that turns food waste back into food.

I live on a farm. Most of us don’t. On a farm with chickens, you generate zero food waste. Anything not eaten is thrown to the chickens, who eat it all and use that nutrition to produce eggs, which we then eat. But because the bulk of Americans do not live on land with chickens, they cannot participate in this convenient system.

Mill’s product changes that. Food waste* goes into the bin, where its internal mechanism grinds and dries it over time. A replaceable filter made with coconut husks and charcoal filters odors. You can continue adding food waste to the bin over time, and the company says it will continue to break it down into grounds.

*What Mill can take: Fruits, vegetables, rinds, pits, peels, meat, fish, dairy, small bones, eggshells, plate scrapings.

What Mill can’t take: Large bones from beef/pork/lamb, seafood shells, large amounts of liquid/grease/oils, large amounts of sugar/cake/cookies, compostable plastics/packaging/takeout containers, houseplants, flowers, and of course you shouldn’t throw medicine into it.

You can then use prepaid shipping boxes provided by the company to send these grounds to them. They then further process the grounds into, you guessed it, chicken feed that they distribute (where and to whom is not clear; presumably they sell it to commercial farms).

To participate in this system requires a subscription; the bins are not sold individually. You can either opt for a $396 annual membership, or $45 monthly plus $75 for the bin. Both memberships include the shipping boxes with prepaid labels, replacement filters and customer support. You can learn more here.