Since taking over the brand more than a decade ago, Kristina has carefully introduced several new styles to Manolo Blahnik, all with meaningful ties to the brand’s roots. First was the espadrille, the only shoe made in Spain where Manolo is from (whereas the rest of the collection is manufactured in Italy) and a tennis shoe, lest you might be led to believe Kristina hates trainers. She doesn’t, they just need make sense. “They are a nod to my grandfather who was a big tennis player,” she says. “I said to my uncle, if we’re going to do something that has a rubber soul, it needs to be minimalist.”
Katrina Lawson Johnston/Courtesy of Manolo Blahnik
Beyond branching into new styles, Kristina has also brought the brand into new markets, celebrating the opening of their Shanghai store last autumn, marking the first time Manolo Blahnik made landfall in China after 22 years of litigation to win their trademark back, and now opening in Milan this year, the city where their shoes are made.
Everything Kristina does is considered, as informed by her architecture training, and designed to last through generations. “If you invest in something that we’ve created, it’s meant to stand the test of time,” she says. “It’s meant to be a work of art, a piece of sculpture, which is why I feel we’re not fashion. We would never define ourselves as a fashion brand. Manolo himself called himself a cobbler (which is a little bit too simplified for my terms), but he’s an artisan, and I think what we are is we are a specialist artisan object that happens to be a shoe.”
It’s this very conviction that has allowed Kristina to remain steadfast even in these unpredictable times, and the idea of the distant future does not scare her the way it might some brands. When asked about her proudest moments so far, Kristina shares all the ways in which the brand is fostering the next generation of artisans through scholarships at UAL and eventually programmes at their factories and ateliers. In her blueprint for the future, what does success look like?
“I want be a part of bringing craft back into the front and centre of objects that we choose to have in our lives,” she says, “And I want people 20 years from now to come to us saying, I bought these Manolo Blahnik shoes 20 years ago, and I still hold onto them because they’re part of my memory, they’re part of my life.”