“Architecture and footwear are similar in that the construction houses people and carries people. If you think about a high-heeled United Nude shoe, it carries a human being (the wearer) and houses part of her person (the foot). Because of the smaller scale, a shoe is more mobile, while most architecture remains stationary.” – Rem D. Koolhaas, shoe designer and architect and nephew of the creator of the greatest building this decade. His “porn toe” shoes are my obsession, much more comfortable then they look. He adds, “women’s footwear you can make a lot of women happy with your products, whereas in traditional architecture you are working with one client for several years. I guess making many women happy is part of the reason I’ve become a shoe designer—and it’s part of the fun that sets shoe design apart from architecture.” Perhaps that also explains Zaha Hadid’s collaboration with the Brazilian plastic shoe house Melissa. Silver in size 41, please.
Reviewing Ed and Nancy Kienholz’s recreation of Amsterdam’s red-light district, The Hoerengracht “at least two men writing about the piece have felt the need to share personal stories of interactions with the Amsterdam red-light district, or with prostitutes. Richard Dorment opened his Telegraph review with a paragraph on his schoolboy adventures in Amsterdam (supervised by a Jesuit; what a shame I went to a Church of England school). It is ‘not irrelevant to the exhibition’, he adds. Then Tom Lubbock in the Independent tells us ‘I have never paid for sex. But off the top of my head I can think of three male friends who have, and perhaps still do.’ Too much information. WAY too much. What next, a link to their Facebook pages?” (via.)
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