What Roger Vivier is known for
Roger Vivier opened his own maison in Paris in 1937 and went on to patent the buckle-throated pump in 1942, design the coronation shoes for Queen Elizabeth II in 1953, and create the first stiletto heel in 1954; the house's boutique stands at 20 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré.
Roger Vivier opened his Paris maison in 1937 and became footwear's great inventor: he patented the buckle-throated pump, designed Queen Elizabeth II's gold-kidskin coronation shoes in 1953, and in 1954 — working with Dior, whose shoes he signed jointly, an unheard-of credit — created the stiletto heel itself, steel-cored and epochal. The Comma heel, the Choc, the Virgule: he sculpted heels the way Brancusi sculpted birds.
The second immortal object came in 1965: the Belle Vivier buckle pump for Yves Saint Laurent's Mondrian collection, sealed forever when Catherine Deneuve wore it in Belle de Jour. That square buckle remains the house's monogram in metal.
Tod's Group revived the maison in the 2000s; Gherardo Felloni directs it today from the 20 rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré boutique, mining the archive with jeweler's wit — crystal buckles, embellished slingbacks, the Viv' Run sneaker translating the buckle for pavement. Paris shoe-making's aristocratic line, unbroken: the heel as signature, the buckle as crown.
In the press
- Vogue 2025
How ORBIS reads this city
Best for — Comma heels and Parisian shoe jewelry since 1937
France.
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In the Journal
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