1970’s Fashion | Women's Footwear in America

Rock ‘N’ Roll Project | Martin Scorsese

July 3, 2015 § 3 Comments

Walking down 48th Street and Lexington Avenue today I found myself wondering where I was as I passed by Colony Music. At first I thought maybe it had been reopened as a smaller version of itself until I realized I had walked into the middle of the set for Martin Scorsese’s new HBO show Rock ‘N’ Roll. Alas the PA who asked me to move along snapped me out of my fantasy flashback in time. They even dirtied up the streets and a couple of the drivers for the vintage cars were engaged in a real life drama as they verbally duked it out.

Weejuns – The Original Penny Loafer

April 12, 2014 § 17 Comments

When I think of my favorite shoes growing up 3 come to mind. My huaraches from Mexico. My dad taught us to stand in the bathtub with them on and then wear until dry so they could conform to your feet. My moccasins that were sent to us every year — I always thought from a friend of my dad’s at Minnetonka. I only just recently learned that my Dad had worked as a designer and stylist for Minnehaha (a contemporary or Minnetonka) in the 1950’s — one of the advantages of having a dad in the shoe business who was well liked was the shoes that came with that. Read more about my dad who would wake us up singing “there’s no business like shoe business ” — Ode To An Older Parent And Tribute To The Veteran In My Life by award winning Television writer sister Liz Benjamin. It pretty much says it all.

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…and my 3rd favorite were my Penny Loafers. Going to school in Florida I wore them without socks and always with 2 new Pennies.

Courtesy Library of Congress, Reproduction Number: LC-USW3-039059-E (b&w film nitrate neg.) LC-DIG-fsa-8d33850 (digital file from original neg.)

Loafing Around | A Brief History of Fashion’s Favorite Flat

In 1936 George Henry Bass created the first Penny Loafer based on a Norwegian farm shoe and called them Weejuns.

Audrey Hepburn

College Days. My mother is the first woman on the bottom holding the cigarette.

College Days. My mother is the first woman bottom left.

Clogs

January 26, 2014 § 4 Comments

Disney World, 1972

I recently found this fabulous photo of my mother–no wonder she ran kicking and screaming from Manhattan when my grandfather retired to Florida, and we followed. I love the clogs she’s wearing. It reminded me of a store on Beach Drive in St. Petersburg we use to visit that only sold Scandinavian products called The Straw Goat.

Beach Drive, St. Petersburg, Florida

I will definitely be writing more at a later date on my mother who was voted Dream Girl at The University of Wisconsin. Feeling nostalgic on this snowy day I decided to take a trip to one of my favorite places — The Scandinavia House.