It’s great to be back home after one of my busiest trips to Italy to date. I was working on prototypes for autumn winter 2013, and here are a few pics of what took place.

 

After visiting all three local tanneries we finally found the gold specchio leather I wanted to use for a lace-up and loafer style. As you can see I was pretty excited about it and got down for a bit of “where’s wally” with my gold top against the amazing ‘mirror’ leather.

 

Here are the first round of design ‘covers’ – which are just the designs drawn onto their last shapes to give a good 3D representation of the shoe. You can see here that I’m going with some classic detailed dress styles for AW13, but can’t wait to bring them out of their shell with an unusual colour palette. You can expect lots of kid suede, specchio leather and some pretty brilliant printed pony.

 

One of my favourite stages of the early design process is finding the perfect heel. Traipsing around the local heel makers can be a tiring business, but the heel shape dictates the entire silhouette of the shoe and can really make or break a style so it’s very exciting to find the perfect block to use.  (Here’s one for all those mid-heel requests we’ve had coming through!!! See, I'm listening.)

 

Each evening there are lots of decisions to be made on my hotel bed ‘desk’ before getting back together with the guys to implement my comments the next day … so a fair bit of late night margarita pizza is involved. It amazes me that after so many trips now I still never tire of this national treasure.

I must admit I am quite a sucker for great store window and tend to really lose it over VM that follows a simple format yet, you guessed it, involves amazing colour. Clearly there is no shortage of that in Milan so here are a few of my favourite stores snapped on the way to dinner this week.

 

Louis Vuitton absolutely takes the cake with this arrow theme … to be honest they can’t really put a step wrong when it comes to their windows … and this rotation is no exception.

 

Prada stopped me in my tracks with their fruity luggage arrangement … but it definitely has a LOT to do with the loafer slippers on show. Um, excuse me, can someone please bring me a chair I need to sit down.

 

Ferragamo and Valentino show what you can achieve with simple mannequins and great lighting … and um some pretty spectacular product!

 

Most of the stores in this street (Via Monte Nepoleone) and surrounds are big label stores for obvious reasons, but some of the ‘lesser known’ stores put on an equally fine show.

We happened to be in Milan on the day that the Marni for H&M collection was released. I couldn’t help but get in on the action! It was a pretty big deal as you can tell by the advertising on the side of the duomo!

 

 I hear there were wrist bands and ‘allocated time slots’ in London stores … but they took a much more Italian approach in Milan (chaos!) All women’s lines were sold out by 2pm that day.

 

 

The Marni mania was cause for a calming drink on the roof-top terrace of La Rinascente department store which overlooks the Duomo spires … as all good tourists would know! (And a pic of my purchases in situ).

 

More to come from our ‘time out’ in Italy as we make our way down South to work on next Winter’s collection.

 

 I am very excited to report that our Winter Collection has just arrived from Italy after five long weeks at sea.

So, I thought it would be nice to officially introduce you to our amazing stockists for the coming season, and the names of the brilliant people who will help you out when you visit them;

Kamahl at “Horse with No Name”
203 Greville street

Prahran VICTORIA 3181

ph: 03 9077 7002

 

Andrea at “Andrea Gold “
104 Bridge Road
Richmond VICTORIA 3121

ph: 03 9428 1226

 

Jess at “The Assembly Hall”
96 Douglas Parade
Williamstown VICTORIA 3016

ph: 03 9397 6928

 

Raea at “Sycamore”
119 Martin Street
Gardenvale VICTORIA 3186

ph: 03 9596 1881

 

Tamara at “Perugia”
367 Glenhuntly Road
Elsternwick VICTORIA 3185

ph: 03 9523 6803

 

 Jo at “Cloud 9”

11 South Concourse
Beaumaris VICTORIA 3193

ph: 03 9589 3105

 

Rae at “Tinky”
2/344 Pakington Street
Geelong VICTORIA 3220

ph: 03 9522 8888

 

Megan at “Habbot pop-up store”
22 Howey Place
Melbourne VICTORIA 3000

ph: 0488 005 750

 

And for you lovers of the on-line shopping experience there’s

www.styletread.com.au

and

www.habbotstudios.com

 

They’ve each curated the collection in their own special way, so make sure you give them a call to check if they have the shoe you’re looking for … or just turn up and be surprised!
 

Recently we photographed the next Summer collection for the look-book we’ll be using to introduce the range to our wholesales stockists, both here … and abroad when we show at Micam shoe fair in Milan in March.

Here is a sneak preview of the collection titled “PICNIC” which takes inspiration in both colour and style from the 1955 film Picnic starring Kim Novak and William Holden … but more about that later.

 

The clever ladies at Ortolan are again art directing the book and my new favourite stylist, Kate Gaskin wove her magic with what will hopefully be the first of many styling jobs for habbot.

 

 ... this collection won't of course be available to purchase for ages (like August) ... but like most things in this (shoe) world ... good things come to those who wait!

 

ONE of the MANY good things about having a shop is that the odd stylist might just walk in off the street and ask to use some of your shoes in a photo shoot they're working on.

And exactly this happened when Carlos Mangubat cruised through our doors a few months back when we were residing in the GPO ... and here are the results published in Karamel recently!

 

...hello 'Misty' black & white pump. (now $190.00)

 

... some serious 'cat & mouse' action going on here between these two.

 

... the male model's name is Magnus. Now that's a pretty cool name if you ask me. hmmm 'Magnus Abbott' ... would that work do you think?

...Grace is a lovely name too. But its no 'Magnus'.

... these classic beauties are of course ferrgamo ... but we're happy to share a shoot with Salvatore any day! 

Our Italian shoe makers are putting the finishing touches on the Autumn Winter 2012 collection as we speak! (Yes - they are working through Christmas to make up for some lost time caused by a leather delay).

Normally I would be there during these final stages, but everything was progressing very well last time I visited (in November) and so I took the opportunity to stay at home and open the Chapel street store. Consequently, there has been a lot of skyping and photos being emailed back and forth. Here are a few they just sent of the hand painted styles with brogue punching detail.

 

 

Although it’s pretty hot in Melbourne right now, I’m already thinking about all the winter wardrobe possibilities of this group. I'm not wanting to play favourites, but the “Juggler” chelsea boot is my secret pick of them at this stage!

(They’re available to purchase in Feb/March. Sign up to the newsletter on the home page for exact dates.)

 

Week one in our latest POP UP shop has been a goodie.

Its been wonderful to re-aquaint myself with good 'ol Chapel street, and discover that a few other newies have moved into the strip lately too (Life with Bird, ksubi and Top Shop).

We're a stones throw from Scanlan, Zimmerman, Gorman, Saba, Arthur Galan, Collette, Sass & Bide .... and next door to the always lovely (and uniquely Melbourne) Bisonte!

So if you're in the neighbourhood please drop in to say hello ... and if you've got a man attached to you, tell him we've got a 'man chair' with daily sports pages in the shop especially for him!

 .... plus the amazing 'carmella' range of pony skin bags by Sarah Conners are available in our store too!!

 

589 Chapel Street - South Yarra.

(3 doors down from Country Road). 

 

 

At the moment I’m travelling to our workrooms in Italy about four times a year so have really refined my ‘travel essentials’ list. It’s taken a while to get to this point, so I thought I may as well share my findings.

 

Here are my top 5 best travel buys.

 

My ‘business class’ days are a distant memory (now that I’m my own boss), but my Bose noise cancelling headphones go a long way to bringing a bit of ‘business class’ serenity into the back of the bus!

My very clever husband gave them to me and I thank him every time I turn them on to block out the engine roar, a snoring neighbour, an unhappy baby or more often all of the above!

 “... a solid investment for anyone who appreciates the sound of silence!” according to choice mag!

Buy them here.

 

I didn’t think I’d ever get the hang of sleeping upright, so these pillows have a lot to be proud of.

Forget about those inflatable jobs … you can’t beat the squishy bean bag variety. (Very handy for preventing an embarrassing falling-asleep-and-dribbling-on-your-neighbour situation too!)

Find them here.

 

You cannot fully appreciate the joy of a 4-wheel suitcase until you’ve tried one!

A big step up from a 2-wheeler, because “pulling” becomes “guiding” when it comes to this genius luggage concept. Very handy for airport halls, but down-right incredible when you’ve traversing no less than six train station platforms as I do each time I visit Italy.  

 

I hate stopping to buy water when I’m travelling, so I think I’ve found the solution to this problem with my Vapur water pouch!

My friend put me onto these recently and I’m sold I tell you. They are foldable, flexible, collapsible, reusable, and are BPA (Bisphenol A) free!

Get hold of them here.

 

Nothing much needs to be said on this subject. I’ve been known to get through a pack of them before the safety demo is complete.

They’re great for sorting out a mid-flight sugar craving too … if they make it that far into the journey of course.  

 

So, if you’re heading away on a long haul flight for the holidays ... or just somewhere groovy near-by, like Mildura for instance, I hope you have a happy and safe trip! xx

 

November was a great month as it's the one month of the season that we're not either out selling to stores or designing/making. So it's the perfect opportunity for me to stop and collect my (personal) marbles ... And try to focus on some big picture habbot stuff.

Here's what I've been up to …