Manolo’s Shoe Blog

Manolo says, the Manolo’s internet friend the wonderfully talented Linda Grant she has written the most flattering things about the Manolo and the fashion blogs in this month’s issue of the British version of the Vogue.

However, the Manolo must take the pains to clarify this passage.

…I was at the site of Manolo. Not Manolo Blahnik, but his namesake, an anonymous New Yorker who knows everything about shoes.

It was my first and indeed the first fashion blog- the prototype from which all others struggle to keep up. Clicking on I found that there were thousands of people across the world nattering about fashion

Ayyyyy! The Manolo has never claimed to be the first fashion blogger, indeed the Manolo has only claimed to be the first shoe blogger, and perhaps, if pressed, the first person to have the blog about the ladies accessories.

Indeed, when the Manolo began his humble shoe blog in October of the 2004, there were already several blogs which focused on the fashion, and in particular there were four of these early fashion blogs which influenced the Manolo’s decision to take up the fashion blogging:

No Good For Me. The blogger Kat perhaps deserves the credit as the first of the fashion blogs, having started in May of the 2003. The Manolo was reading this blog in the summer of the 2004 and found it to be most charming and fun, especially the Kat’s personal musings about her fashion choices.

My Fashion Life. Another blog from the middle of the 2003, the Manolo remembers reading this blog in the fall of 2004 and being impressed by how it was the first blog which treated the fashion news in the way that the political bloggers treated the world news, criticizing and challenging the orthodoxy of the fashion press.

Primp. Now sadly mostly defunct, the Primp was one of the regular readings of the Manolo back in the day.

Give Me Spirit Fingers Dammit. The Manolo has made no secret of the fact that he is the huge fan of the blogger Spirit Fingers. She is so smart, and so hilariously funny, and she has the sharpest eye for the absurd the Manolo has ever encountered. Not only is she perhaps the best uknown blogger in the world, and deserves to be famous, but she is also the most directly influential on the Manolo of the early fashion bloggers.

The Manolo wishes he could go back and recreate the liberating feelings he experienced when he first discovered these early fashion blogs. Here were the smart young people who were taking the fashion seriously, and who did not have the obligations of the professional fashion press to be nice to the advertisers!

Who knew such things were possible? Who knew that you could post your opinions and musing about the fashion and the awful celebrities who abuse it, and have the people read them? Such joy of discovery!

So, the Manolo wishes you to know that he was not the first fashion blogger. The first shoe blogger, yes, as far as he knows. The first fashion blogger? No.

Manolo says, it is Tuesday, time to see what the Manolo is…

Reading…

Watching…

Listening to…

Yes, it is true, the Manolo is one of those Monty Python geeks, but in the subdued sort of the way, as one who perhaps only occasionally hums the Bruces’ Song to himself under his breath while browsing in the philosophy section of the bookstore.

Manolo says, here for your holiday enjoyment are the festive shoes from the Anne Klein New York.

Manolo says, ????

Manolo says, the resemblence, it is both odd and undeniable.

Manolo says, here is the latest column of the Manolo for the Express of the Washington Post.

Dear Manolo,

I desperately need a new pair of casual winter boots, but I’m a poor working girl. What would you recommend?

Campbell

Manolo says, winter it has finally arrived in the Washington, D.C., soon to bring with it the first light dusting of snow, at which point the drivers of Washington, all of whom were apparently raised in San Diego, will simultaneously lose control of their automobiles.

Of the course, life must still go on, even if the streets are filled with slush and the abandoned SUVs. The cat needs the milk and you have run out of the moisturizer, and so you must brave the elements and walk to the drugstore through the winter wonderland.

But you want to look your best, because you never know when you may bump into that Georgetown water polo player on whom you have the small crush.

Happily, you are not worried because you have recently purchased the new pair of the reasonably priced Timberland McKenneys, the handsome, wedge-heeled, weatherproof boots with the faux fur that looks most chic in that outdoorsy-ruggedy way which appeals to the broad-shouldered athletic boys.