The Cobbler to the Stars
Manolo says, here is the article about one of LA’s greatest, and yet least well known peoples, Pasquale Fabrizio, the Cobbler to the Stars.
Purses and shoes you could barter for family members are commonplace at Pasquale’s. A $45,000 Chanel croc bag breezed through recently. He’s seen more celebrity feet than a Beverly Hills podiatrist. Fabrizio, master cobbler to the stars — to anyone, really, who appreciates a well-kept shoe — is a fixer of ailing soles. And souls.
People often have their hearts broken by shoes and accessories. They come to Fabrizio looking for a fix. One woman had fallen in love with her J. Crew leather flip-flops. Alas, they had been discontinued. She asked Fabrizio to make more. Could it be done?
“Understand one thing,” he said, “anything can be done.”
Louboutins are like Ferraris: always in the shop. Their trademark arterial red soles need periodic touchups. Fabrizio holds a tiny vial of custom red paint mix in the air like it’s the elixir of life. He has even innovated upon his own innovation. Recently he came across a thin, gleaming sheath of rubber in Louboutin red. Rubber won’t scuff off like paint. “Everybody is going to want this,” he says.
Clients have been so impressed with Fabrizio’s knowledge of shoe architecture, they have begged him to go shopping with them. They tell him they’d pay him $400 an hour to advise them on the merits of Cole Haan versus Gucci loafers. Five hundred! Six!
Trust the Manolo, getting the good shoe advice is worth whatever it costs, as few things are as important as finding the beautifully made shoes that fit well.
And, Fabrizio Pasquale is the man who clearly knows what he is talking about when it comes to the shoes.
.A passionate man, Fabrizio has strong opinions about shoes. Uggs deeply offend him. Especially scruffy ones. “It looks like a slipper, for god’s sake. You see these young women letting their boots go down at the heel and you think, What is that about?”
Another phenomenon that has recently been driving him nuts is this distressing trend: People ask him to make their boots look worn in. “How many years?” he’ll ask. Ten? Twenty? But what exactly does 10 years’ worth of wear look like? It’s a gray area.
He hates the Uggs? Clearly, he is the man of uncommon good sense.
July 10th, 2008 at 12:10 pm
He seems to be the man of the great good sense. La BellaDonna suspects that he thinks the notion of deliberately damaging the good leather boot to look “worn in” to be the complete foolishness, which it is. This is the man dedicated to the preserving of the shoe and boot, and yet people want him to deliberately inflict the harm? Foolishness, I tell you. Indeed, La BellaDonna would be delighted to have this icon return her beloved Butteros (after nearly seven years of the near-daily wear) to their pristine newness - or as close as one might reasonably come thereto. A stitch is needed here and there, the lining, it needs to be mended over one instep, the welting, it is somewhat cracked; but it is from the honest toil, and the many weary miles of supporting La BellaDonna through the vicissitudes of daily life, that this wear has occurred; not through the foolish vanity of the celebrity, who wishes to pretend that he or she has done something other than step from a limousine in the brand new boots.
July 10th, 2008 at 1:41 pm
I have a confession. I have a pair of uggs. Of course, they’ve never been worn off my property. I use them as slippers when its cold out.
July 10th, 2008 at 6:40 pm
He seems like a nice man. The particle borrowed heavily from the yelp reviews, though. That’s not very classy journalism.
July 10th, 2008 at 8:44 pm
Such a charming tale! I’ll have to bookmark it and reread it when I am tempted to waste money on many pairs of cheap shoes, rather than saving up patiently for one fancy pair…
July 10th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
When you said one of L.A.’s greatest I truly thought the blog was going to be about me!
July 13th, 2008 at 7:03 pm
Ah, custom made shoes…the ultimate luxury. One of these days when I become a titan of industry I’m going to be Fabrizio’s best customer.