A pair of Golden Goose sneakers was one of the luxury industry’s best-kept secrets – though the new boutique at The Dubai Mall will let you in on it. CEO Silvio Campara talks exclusively to Gulf Business on the brand’s ascendancy to cult status
Scuffed sneakers were generally regarded as a sign of living rough – that’s until Golden Goose entered the sneaker market in 2007. Its artisanally distressed box-fresh skate- and basketball-style kicks made the worn-in look a signature aesthetic of the brand.
Venice-based couple Alessandro Gallo and Francesca Rinaldo started Golden Goose in 2000. But from 2000 until 2007, they were a fringe player in the industry. The Venetian area had skilled craftsmen who specialised in working with leather and hence one of Golden Goose’s biggest calling cards before sneakers were its leather jackets and boots.
The couple ran the creative and business side of the brand, and as a result, were constantly travelling. That’s when they decided they needed sneakers that weren’t like anything else on the market at the time – handmade pairs that shunned industrial processes and instead relied on the same level of craft and skill used to make formal leather shoes.
They turned to several formal shoemakers in and around Venice, but only one obliged. “Golden Goose was the first company that started the inversion of all these traditional manufacturers in the Venetian area who were formal shoemakers but then became sneaker makers.
“The way you make a pair of Golden Goose sneakers is the same way you make a pair of formal shoes. The sole is injected, the side completely glued within the body and every single sneaker is treated and distressed manually and everyone is different from the other one,” explains Golden Goose’s maverick 40-year-old CEO Silvio Campara.
This story is from the August 2019 edition of Gulf Business.
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This story is from the August 2019 edition of Gulf Business.
Start your 7-day Magzter GOLD free trial to access thousands of curated premium stories, and 8,500+ magazines and newspapers.
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