It’s been a long four years since the thought of starting my own bussiness first crossed my mind. At that point, it was wishful thinking more than anything else. I mean, where would I start, what would I do? What does the world need that I have a lot of? I figured it would be a thousand times more difficult for an incorrigible dreamer with no bussiness skills such as myself to get their act together and make something happen, but the more I thought about it, the more excited I got. After all, with so many bussinesses flourishing all around, I’m sure I’m making it sound harder than it actually is…right?

Wrong.

It is a hundred thousand times worse.

But it is also invigorating to find and express yourself through your work, pour your soul out, be vulnerable and open to criticism, really believe in something and give it your best shot. To take a risk and feel your temples pulsating. To dive head first into the unknown with no parachute. To talk about it and lose yourself in the details. To let a friend take a sneak peek at what you do and watch their first reaction – their whole face lights up in a smile as they say “This is you, entirely you. This is beautiful.”

I would even go as far as to say that not even the thought of failure could make me doubt myself because no matter what happens, what I do brings colours and joy in peoples’ lives and it’s also a  reminder of their magic, a unique combination of colours, emotions and ideas they bring into the world and should be celebrated every day.

Something exciting is literally afoot and I am more than happy to finally be able to spread the word and share with you…

Eclectics – the funkiest shoes you’ve ever worn. Each individual shoe is designed with eight separate leather pieces, making a pair twice as colourful. The most interesting part of what we do is that the same colour combination is never repeated, which makes you the happy owner of a pair of shoes like no other.

Among all the shoe related stories, experiences and memories I have (and I could even come up with my own personal Top 10 songs about shoes, where Johnny Boy’s “You’re the generation who bought more shoes and you get what you deserve” would be somewhere, at the very top), I’ll just explore one of the most important, to give you an idea of when, where and how the idea became palpable.

It all started back in 2015. I was working in the most beautiful part of Bucharest, on Jean Louis Calderon Street, close to Magheru Boulevard, where some of the best, oldest and the most expensive stores displayed their treasures. One day, they opened a new shoe shop right next to Scala Cinema. The prices were reasonable and their samples – a palette of colours, prints and leather textures for any magpie to get hooked. And that was when it stroke me:

why just choose a pair of shoes from the bunch like most people? why not complicate things a little? why not combine three or four colours and arrange them differently on each shoe to really make them my own?

Of course there were complains about the minutia of such work, of course I had to explain exactly what I wanted and how I wanted it done over and over again (when I myself wasn’t exactly sure), of course that, instead of the shade of turquoise I had asked for, I got “baby blue” and even so, those shoes still turned out to be so amazing, they got people both in their 20’s and their 70’s to say “I would definitely wear those!”.

 

But something was missing. They were not…obvious enough. I wanted something that would be absolutely impossible to ignore.

In my mind, I started making colour combinations for the next pair  (I was going for turquoise, yellow and silver – the Schweppes Bitter Lemon can) when I thought

but why just use the same colours for both shoes? why not complicate things a slightly bit more? why not make a totally different colour combination on each? that would really be something.

Unfortunately, it only got as far as that, as I soon moved to London, the shoe store was replaced by a library and it would take me another two years to eventually act upon that random idea of mine.

 

But I did and it thrills me to know that this is only the beginning of the journey.

I hope you will love Eclectics at least half as much as I do.

 

(To be continued)

 

Green Eyed Kisses,