Best of British brands: Terry de Havilland

Best of British // Terry de Havilland: putting the sole into rock ‘n’ roll

If we were playing that word association game (a game I’ve never actually played in real life, have you?) and you were to say ‘Terry de Havilland’, these are some of the things I might blurt out in a fashionable fit of Tourettes:

  • Wedges! Ankle straps!
  • Snakeskin! Iconic!
  • Shoemaker to the stars!
  • British! Rock ‘n’ roll!
  • Wankers! < sorry, got carried away with the Tourettes theme there. My bad.

Terry de Havilland wedges
Terry de Havilland, as he himself puts it, is ‘The Rock and Roll cobbler’. And if you’re expecting a camp Gepetto type character, think again.

Terry (born with the more mundane moniker of Terrence Higgins), is a bona fide East End geezer with rock star tendencies who has carved a career out of making disco shoes for decades. Famed mostly for his flamboyant tiered wedges and platforms, in trademark brights and shimmering snakeskin.

“I guess you can say that shoes are in my psyche,” says de Havilland, who started helping out at his father’s shoe shop at the tender age of 5. His dad made shoes for the girls of Soho’s Windmill Theatre in the 1940s.

vintage Terry de Havilland wedgesThe now iconic metallic wedges De Havilland first designed in the late Sixties were made…

…either when I was on acid, or on a comedown from acid, some of them are really psychedelic. They are based on shoes that my dad used to make in the Forties. I went up to his loft once at the end of the Sixties and found the old wedge in the attic and persuaded him to start making them again.

Following his father’s tragic early death, Terry took over the business and opened his first store,‘Cobblers to the World’ (whatta name!) in 1972 attracting an A-list clientele, including Bianca Jagger, Elton John, Patti Boyd, Shirley Bassey, Rudolph Nureyev and Lee Radziwill.

Playboy 1973 Terry de Havilland shoes

I loved the 60s and 70s and lived the life. I designed most of my shoes on acid and the opening party for my shop in the King’s Road was famous for the three Cs – champagne, cocaine and caviar.

God knows who was there – everybody. Half the time in the shop I didn’t know who people were – I was usually doing drugs out the back. I didn’t recognise until she came to sign the cheque. She bought a pair of thigh-high satin stiletto boots in size eight, and then told me they were for her sister – Jackie Kennedy, who was married to Onassis at the time.

That quote alone is essentially why I love Terry de Havilland.

I also admire his bounce-back-ability; his name and profile have drifted in and out of fashion – literally – over the years but he’s the original Comeback Kid, adding the likes of Kate Moss, Kylie, Cher, Sienna Miller, Dita Von Teese and Jessie J to his modern day client list.

vintage Terry de Havilland stars 'n' stripes wedgesHe created Tim Curry’s platforms for The Rocky Horror Show; thirty pairs of biker boots for Angelina Jolie’s Tomb Raider, and designed the footwear for BAFTA-award winning film The Velvet Goldmine.

For me, it was Kate Moss (well, and Sienna Miller… but we all know Miller mirrors Moss) who put the De Havilland’s Margaux wedge firmly on my fashion radar. Oh, how I wanted a pair! I didn’t stop thinking about those shoes for nearly a decade and was finally able to get my mitts on my own silver snakeskin pair a couple of years ago when I started working for ASOS and was given the gift of a tasty staff discount.

terry-de-havilland-milly

They are, without a doubt, my most prized shoes. Yes, even above my vintage Louboutins. Y’see, de Havillands are designed with debauchery in mind: the comfortable wedge sole, the ankle strap keeping them firmly attached now matter how drunk you are or how hard you dance – the admiring glances you get.

They even survive the ultimate fashion test; tackling the pesky cobbles at Somerset House during London Fashion Week.

Silver Terry de Havilland wedges

De Havilland doesn’t ‘do’ traditional bridal shoes, but loves making honeymoon heels.
He made a ‘very naughty’ version of the Margaux for Kate Moss for her nuptials: a scarlet snakeskin mule with a stiletto heel.
On one sole, ‘Fuck you’ is spelled out in Swarovski crystals; on the other, ‘Fuck me’. Brilliant.

Terry-de-Havilland-Portrait

Winning the Draper’s Lifetime Achievement Award in 2010, celebrating 50 years in the biz with an exhibition in Selfridges’ Shoe Gallery last year and having just re-launched his main range, De Havilland is also a professor at the University of the Arts London. It seems hard to believe that he’s 73. he reckons: “it’s all the drugs; I’m pickled”

I think Terry de Havilland is now as legendary as the stars he serviced (so to speak) over the years. And he must have more stories still to tell. That’s one autobiography I’d love to read. How about it, Terry? *puts hand up* I’ll write it!

For more info or to shop Terry de Havilland shoes, hot foot it (soz) to tdhcouture.com

  • Comments

  • avatar
    jon

    Splendidd piece

    • avatar
      Natalie

      Why thanks. Gorra lorra love for TDV 😉

  • avatar
    jon

    what does TDV mean, soz , slightly perplexed from.. Tonbridge Wells

  • avatar
    jon

    Apologies, Apologies I realise now you meant Terry de havilland, It hought it meant a long distance lorry drivers liscence or a venerial desease,.

    As ever

    Lord Seymour Flange

    • avatar
      Natalie

      Ha ha! Or should I say: LOL at the STD refrerence 😉

  • avatar
    Anonymous

    This is such a good piece and I can’t believe I hadn’t heard of Terry de Havilland until now, but he sounds like my sort of designer. His designs are clearly genius, having stood the test of time. Now, how do I get my hands on a pair?!

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