When Paul Andrew teased a few photos of shoes on his personal Instagram, it was clear that the next Salvatore Ferragamo collection would be different from the last one.
Days before the Italian brand’s Milan Fashion Week show, its creative director posted a few snaps of the upcoming fall ’21 collection footwear: There were retro-future pumps, with square toes, cantilevered pedestal heels and metallic hues, something out of a ’60s mod-meets-outer-space moment. There were also sneakers; sock-like biker boots, color blocked in blue, gray, cream and black (unisex, according to Andrew).
Turns out, there was even more to the retro-future, sci-fi thing. For the entire fall ’21 show, which presented both men’s and women’s lines, Andrew turned to classic sci-fi films such as “Gattaca,” “The Matrix,” and “Until The End of the World” to inform the collection, titled “Future Positive.”
“In fashion, the past exerts a gravity – we are always drawn to it,” Andrew said in his show notes. “For this season I wanted to invert that physics. The objective was to engineer a collection that sees the present through a prism of the future – unleashing a multitude of fresh perspectives.”
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As a shoe designer, Andrew made sure that his concept was felt in the footwear. The selection of futuristic sneakers (which also seemed retro, like a ’90s vision of what a futuristic sneaker would look like) gave a sporty element to everything, while the metallic pumps provided a retro glamour duality (the silhouette came from the brand’s iconic F-heel, which the designer has referenced a few times during his time at Ferragamo, including in the spring ’21 collection).
The footwear was met with ready-to-wear in the brand’s iconic leather pieces, especially its outerwear, and Andrew cleverly showed men’s and women’s counterpart looks to bring forth a unisex look that still considered the male and female forms (similar to Prada’s approach this season).
