Hellstern was name-checked in the novels of both Nancy Mitford and F. Scott Fitzgerald and if a flapper had money to burn, this particular shoe emporium was where she would go to salivate over their silver kid slippers and blood-red suede bar shoes.
Caroline CoxVintage Shoes (Carlton Books, 2008)
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1948 | Hellstern & Sons patent
Source: INPI (Institute National de la Propriété Industrielle - France)
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Nancy Mitford and Francis Scott Fitzgerald? COOL!
Only it's not true. On both counts, we checked. Now, why everyone would write such things?
Only it's not true. On both counts, we checked. Now, why everyone would write such things?
- too many pictures and not enough text?
- hearsay?
- crosschecking is waste of time?
- all of the above?
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1922 | Hellstern & Sons patent
Source: INPI (Institute National de la Propriété Industrielle - France)
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And then some:
Their premises were in the Place Vendome and their clientele included society women, stage performers and royalty. They are mentioned in Proust's novel.
Source: Fine Arts Museums Of San Francisco
A fit description for Hellstern & Sons, but it goes without saying that dear old Proust didn't mention them. Ever. You know the end is near if even museums fail you.
There are however a few novels that mention Hellstern and Sons like "The Shoe Queen" by Anna Davis (but they - the Hellstern shoes - are mentioned in passing as the queen shoes are Perugias); or "Man In A Hurry", a 1914 French classic by Paul Morand.
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1920 - 1928 | Hellstern And Sons
© Romans; Musée international de la Chaussure
Photograph Christophe Villard
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Noteworthy is the biography of Gerald and Sarah Murphy:
She (Sarah Murphy) told the Hemingways that she was pining to go to Paris in September:
I want new clothes & new ideas (in order named) & Hellstern shoes & perfumery & trick hats, & linge [underwear], not to mention the eve. dress & to sit hours with Léger & his friends in cafés, & haunt rue la Boétie, & see every good new play & all music if any, & be back here in about three days & eleven hrs. twenty-seven mins. . . .
Amanda Vaill
Everybody Was So Young: Gerald and Sara Murphy, A Lost Generation Love Story
The Murphys were a wealthy couple of American expats in Paris whose circle of friends included John Dos Passos, Ferdinand Léger, Hemingway, Picasso (who even portrayed Sara Murphy - true story) and Francis Scott Fitzgerald who used a fictionalized portrait of the Murphys in the novel "Tender Is The Night".
And that is the only link between Hellstern and Francis Scott Fitzgerald.
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Hellstern & Sons | Insole label
© Romans; Musée international de la Chaussure
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