Pavimento · Taranto by Opat 1960s Gunmetal Kitten Heels, AU 8
Gunmetal crinkled textile · short stacked heel · ornamental square buckle · Taranto by Opat Bros · made in Melbourne · 1960s · AU 8 · EU 39 · UK 6 · US 8
Gunmetal crinkled textile upper, a very short stacked heel, and at the vamp a square ornamental buckle set low and perpendicular to the foot. The buckle does not fasten anything; it simply declares itself. The upper material catches the light like watered silk, textured without being coarse, grey without being flat.
Taranto by Opat Bros Pty Ltd, Melbourne, 1960s. The Opat Brothers were among Melbourne's significant mid-century shoe manufacturers, working through the period when Australian leather goods were still made here, when a shoe could be local and also beautiful. The Taranto line sat in the formal register without quite being occasion wear, the kind of shoe that finished a good outfit rather than competing with it. The buckle detail is the whole personality: a piece of jewellery incorporated into the structure, doing nothing functional, communicating everything.
A shoe that knows precisely what it is.
Care
Clean the textile upper with a barely damp cloth and allow to dry completely away from direct heat. The buckle is ornamental; do not apply pressure to the setting.
More on looking after vintage pieces in our care guide.
Size
Measured flat: Insole 26.5cm. AU 8 · EU 39 · UK 6 · US 8.
Our size guide explains how vintage sizing is read here.
Condition
Good. The textile upper shows minimal surface wear consistent with wear and age. Some staining by ball of one foot. No damage to structure. The buckle is secure and intact. Some light scuffing to the heel consistent with use.
Our condition lexicon explains the grades we use.
Before it reaches you
Someone loved this before you did, and I try to honour that properly. Each piece is hand washed, or cleaned in the way that the fabric permits, then steamed until it softens and straightens and feels newly attended to. Wherever a button was missing, it has been replaced with a vintage one from my long-kept collection. Wherever a hem had given way, I fix it by hand. By the time it leaves this room it is genuinely clean, pressed, whole, and looked over one final time before I let myself believe it is ready. Not restored. Not made new. Just returned to a state where it can be loved again, by someone who was not there the first time.
Pavimento means the floor, which is a modest name for a shoe until you notice it is the floor that gets walked upon and the shoe that does the walking. The square buckle fastens nothing at all and knows it, sitting at the vamp purely to be a small piece of jewellery that happened to be born onto a shoe. Gunmetal that catches the light like watered silk is a grey with ambitions, and this one keeps them quiet, in the Melbourne manner, letting the buckle speak for the pair of them. It finishes an outfit rather than arguing with it, which is the most self-assured thing a shoe can decline to do.