There is a popular opinion in Russian-language media and social networks that Western fashion brands have made millions from the invention of the Soviet designer. We figured out whether this is really the case.
According to the story presented in the media and social networks, in 1959, Vera Aralova, along with other employees of the Moscow All-Union Fashion House (ODMO), went to Paris for the first Western Soviet fashion show. There she presented her collection of fur products, and instead of shoes she put on the models high boots with a zipper, which she ordered were sewn in the workshops of the Bolshoi Theater. This new product allegedly created a real sensation, and many French shoe manufacturers wanted to buy a patent for the production of such boots. However, Aralova did not have any patent, and the Soviet authorities did not want to deal with such an insignificant matter, as it seemed to them. Soon, Western shoe brands were able to independently reproduce Aralova’s idea and launched the production of boots with zippers, which immediately became fashionable around the world. The Soviet Union later had to purchase production lines for such boots in Austria. The supplement to the Vedomosti newspaper wrote about this “How to spend", publications The Blueprint And "RBC Life», magazines Marie Claire And The Symbol. The story with the boots was included in the script for the series “Red Queen"about the life of fashion model Regina Zbarskaya. Posts about Aralova and the boots she invented can be seen in Facebook, "VKontakte", blogs and on YouTube.
Vera Aralova is a famous Soviet artist and designer. Since 1948, she worked in ODMO, but in the 1960s she concentrated at work in theater and cinema. Some publications say that Aralova was the first to introduce women's boots as such into fashion - before her, women allegedly wore only shoes and ankle boots. In honor of her, new fashionable women's shoes in the West began to be called “Russian boots" Initially, this information began to spread from the words of the artist herself. Her son James Paterson in an interview with the newspaper "Komsomolskaya Pravda“in 2013 he said: “By the way, it was my mother who invented the Cossack boots for women in the 60s.” I remember Lyubov Petrovna (actress Lyubov Orlova - Ed.) asked her: “Vera, why do men have boots and women don’t?” And my mother came up with women's knee-high boots. I made a collection for a show in Paris. And the fashion for “Cossack” boots spread all over the world.” Fashion historian Alexander Vasiliev, whose father was a classmate and long-time friend of Aralova, also talked about this legend in the book “Heirlooms“: “As Vera Ippolitovna later assured me, it was she who introduced high boots into fashion, which, of course, was a fiction. Perhaps in the USSR in 1955, high boots became a novelty, but in Paris they were worn since 1925, and Russian emigrants brought them into fashion.”
In fact, the term “Russian boots” appeared in the West back in the 1910s. It was then that women's boots first came into fashion. How writes biographer of the famous French couturier Paul Poiret Palmer White, this happened thanks to Diaghilev’s Russian Seasons, which inspired Poiret to create a new model of women’s shoes in the old Russian style. The boots were made popular by Poiret's wife and muse, Denise, who attended social events in them.
Subsequently, women's boots came into fashion - for example, in the 1920s - and then went out of it until they were completely established in it.
In one of the publications about Vera Aralova, Alexander Vasiliev clarified: Although women's boots have existed for a long time, "Aralova's contribution was precisely in the zipper - this is an absolute, revolutionary novelty." However, this is not entirely true. Lightning was invented in 1893, and already in 1922 the American brand BFGoodrich began produce shoes with this clasp. The original model was called Mystik Boots, but later its design was slightly changed and renamed Goodrich Zippers. It is thanks to this, by the way, that a zipper in English is called a zipper.
Outwardly, Goodrich Zippers very much resembled Soviet boots, which were popularly called “farewell to youth” (by the way, their production started only in the 1960s). Later, other models of boots began to be equipped with lightning. In the 1920–1930s, the zipper was placed in the front, but later models appeared with a fastener in the back seam and on the side.
A real boom in women's boots arose in the 1960s. Designer in London Mary Quant invented miniskirts, which, unlike airy new-look dresses, went perfectly with boots. Designer in Paris André Courrèges also experimented with mini and geometric shapes, combining them with boots with zippers to mid-calf - this gave his models a cosmic appearance. The emergence of new synthetic materials made it possible to produce boots that fit the leg, like a stocking, the most bold colors.
Thus, we can say with confidence that Vera Aralova was not the inventor of either women's boots in general, or boots with a zipper in particular. However, there are other inaccuracies in publications about her. In particular, they indicate that the show at which she presented her boots to Parisians took place in 1959. It was then that the first French haute couture show took place in the USSR - in Moscow the house of Dior has arrived. However, only Russian-language sources write about the reverse initiative in the same year. In the French publications “Verified” it was not possible to find any information about the Soviet fashion show in Paris in 1959, although such an event (especially considering that Russian-language sources write about it as the first in history) should not have passed by the press. Only on July 13, 1960 in Le Monde appears message about the agreement signed by the USSR and France on mutual conduct industrial exhibitions: Soviet in France and French in the USSR. They should have pass in 1961: the French exhibition is from August 15 to September 15 in Sokolniki, and the Soviet exhibition is from August 25 to September 20 at the Porte de Versailles exhibition center. The program of such exhibitions also included a demonstration of the achievements of light industry - in other words, a fashion show. And he really took place, and the models actually showed some ensembles in boots. Most likely, this particular show is erroneously dated to 1959 in Russian-language publications. And by the way, it was not the first Soviet fashion show abroad. The fact is that at first the Soviet industrial exhibition took place in London (in July 1961). She also had a fashion show - however, summer outfits were shown in the UK, so the British didn’t see Aralova’s boots.
And finally, a number of publications about Aralova’s supposed invention are accompanied by a photograph of the Soviet fashion model Tamara Vladimirtseva in red over-the-knee boots. The captions to the photographs say that these boots are the work of Vera Aralova.
In fact, this photo has nothing to do with Vera Aralova. This is part photo sessions, shot by a Life magazine photographer Bill Ray in August 1968. Tamara Vladimirtseva is wearing a coat and boots from the autumn-winter collection of the Louis Feraud house, presented July 17, 1968.
Thus, although Vera Aralova did use high women's boots with a zipper during the show of her collection in Paris in 1961 (and not in 1959, as many Russian-language media write), she cannot be called their inventor: women's boots (both with and without a zipper) existed before that. The international surge in popularity of women's boots in the 1960s and 1970s was associated not with Aralova's fashion show in Paris, but with the fashion for miniskirts and the spread of new synthetic materials.
Cover photo: still from the series “Red Queen”
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