History of Pendragon year by year – 2003

2003 was a busy year! With lots of juggling of parenthood and running a business and finding time to make shoes thrown in there somewhere! One of the highlights was a collection we made for the Brisbane Exhibition (Ekka) wool parade. I’d grown up going to the Ekka with my family and we would always make our way to the Wool Pavilion to see the annual Wool Parade – a fashion parade featuring local designers. This particular year we were invited to make our own designer footwear from leather given to us from the DPI (Dept of Primary Industries) They included feral goat, ostrich and crocodile. We also included some of our own designs in other leathers and wool. Here is a taste of some of those creations. We continue the skew toe and heel shape theme here and experimented with some Japanese inspired heel shapes.

2003 Wool Parade Brisbane EKKA — 2003 Wool Parade Brisbane Ekka

Geisha girl in ostrich and feral goat leathers

Geisha Girl shoes — Geisha girl shoes in white and gun metal leathers. Insoles feature Chinese fabrics. Handmade heels.

handmade shoes — Geisha girl shoes in Patent leather with handmade heels

Also in 2003 we made a few pairs of shoes for the film Swimming Upstream to be worn by the iconic Australian actress Judy Davis. We visited her in her trailer on set to measure her up. Always an exciting (and nerve wracking) moment. The film, set in Brisbane in the fifties and early sixties, is a family drama centring on the life of Tony Fingleton.

swimming upstream shoes — Shoes made for Judy Davis in Swimming Upstream

August 27, 2021June 12, 2024

History of Pendragon year by year – 2002

Custom-Made Designer-2002 pirate boots jackie

2002 had some grandiose projects and events: Jackie had her first child Tallulah and we got to work on the 2002 adaptation of Peter Pan. It was produced and made on the Gold Coast by Warner Bros, so lots of local people in South East Queensland got work on this one.
Working with the designer Janet Patterson, we were given individual character descriptions, colour schemes, foot measurements and a handful of guidelines but otherwise were given creative freedom and because of a bountiful big-movie budget, we made some elaborate pieces. We tailored boots for Jason Isaacs (Captain Hook) along with boots for the pirates and faeries, and their stunt doubles. It was a bit of a wild rollercoaster ride but we were in our element given our affinity for storybook characters and the fantastical. In the end, we made 33 pairs of boots for the movie. Where are they now?

Captain Hook Jason Isaacs — Captain Hook’s boots

leaf shoes for Peter Pan fairy — Leaf shoes for peter pan fairy

August 17, 2021August 18, 2021

History of Pendragon year by year – 2001

Theatre work was a cornerstone of our work, with the most memorable production we worked on was alongside costume designer Genevieve Blanchett for Queensland Theatre Company’s production: “The Forest”. You can see the taffeta button boots pictured here.

On the fashion side of things, we were developing a side label called Ground Control. We were featured in a lavish photoshoot titled “Hey Honey I’m home” for the Courier Mail in Brisbane.

leather slip ons — “Hey Hone I’m home” slides

The same collection, and a few other over the top creations, were displayed in the Queensland Craft Council’s window display in Fortitude Valley.

Our first work in a feature film was this year as well. SCOOBY DOO! We made the yellow shoes the animatronic dog wore when he dressed as a human to board an aeroplane to Spooky Island. Google Scooby Doo airport scene if you want to see them.

Many of the shoes we made this year very much informed some of the popular designs we still make today.

Here is a great article that was published in Map Magazine in Brisbane in 2001.

Pendragon Shoes Map Magazine Brisbane 2001

July 30, 2021July 30, 2021

History of Pendragon year by year – 2000

The turn of the century started with a bang at Woodford Folk Festival where we usually spend our New Years having a Pendragon Shoes stall. We started making a summer range – up until now we’d largely made boots and shoes, with just a few sandals thrown in for good measure. Crazy really, considering we live in Queensland where you hardly even get to wear boots for more than a month a year because of the warm weather. We made groovy slides with a distinctly spacey theme as well as the Elemental Collection – very much inspired by nature.
The slides featured a skew shaped sole and wide panel on top which was decorated with either a star, a spiral or a spaceship! Lots of fun and very colourful.
The Elemental Collection, inspired by elemental forces in nature, combined texture and colour.
Art nouveau was our muse for the collection, with the movement’s distinct organic aesthetic trickling through the soles and shapes of the shoes. Elemental designs included: Dragonfly nouveau sandals and butterfly sandals (air), fish thongs (water) and the gum leaf sandals and forest leaf sandals (earth).

We still make versions of these today. See the summer page.

Elemental collection – Forest Leaf sandals

July 20, 2021

History of Pendragon year by year – 1999

After the success of our art shoe exhibition in Brisbane in 1998, we were flown to Germany by Novel (same company we did the exhibition for the previous year). In Munich we exhibited lots of art shoes in an exhibition called Art in Shoes in Novel’s offices and adjoining gallery .

Pendragon shoe exhibition — Adrian cataloguing the shoe exhibits

We were also commissioned by sponsors of the exhibition, MCM (yes that fancy luggage company) to create 2 pieces of “shoe art” in their iconic MCM material.

There was a few German newspaper articles and a photo in German vogue. One of the iconic pieces from this exhibition was the Y2K bug shoes. For those who weren’t alive in 1999, on the eve of the change of the century, there was a fear that computers would all go crazy and it was referred to as the Y2K bug. These art boots depict nature taking back over the crashed computer like a crashed cargo plane found in the jungle, reclaimed by the vines and trees. These are the inspiration for many of our designs since then, including the Steampunk Leaf boots.

Also from that exhibition were the fish shoes, eye vine boots, acid jazz, frog princess, and pink skew shoes (photographed for German Vogue) We got to travel a bit around Europe afterwards. We took the frog princess with us and photographed her everywhere, including Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris.

July 19, 2021

History of Pendragon year by year – 1998

1998 was a big year for us. We decided to close our workshop/studio above Elizabeth Arcade in Brisbane and move back to work from Adrian’s house. It was great for 5 years, but we were exhausted from pretty much just working to pay bills. The final straw came when we were commissioned to make a series of acrobat shoes for a troupe of European performers. They all went beautifully…no photos unfortunately. But even more memorable was the fact we got robbed the night they paid us. Someone managed to climb up a drainpipe several flights up, break in through a window and steal all of the money. Always suspected those acrobats! 😉

As the saying goes, as soon as one door closes another one opens. We were asked by a Brisbane Podiatrist to make an exhibition of art shoes for a visiting computer software company from Germany called Novel. They were coming to Brisbane for their international conference and he was in charge of finding some interesting entertainment while the delegates were in town. It was the beginning of a long friendship with our dear friend Brian. Our display was to be part of that. Novel make software that measures pressure and is applied in the shoe and podiatry industry.

We were commissioned to make a branded art shoe for them. Elke made the pictured resin shoe sculpture which showed the coloured pressure technology in art form.

We created a dragon shoe collection and the first owl shoes. They were displayed at the Ridges Hotel in South Bank, Brisbane.

May 27, 2021July 13, 2021

History of Pendragon year by year – 1997

Powerhouse Stepping Out

In 1997, the powerhouse museum in Sydney, acquired several creations from Australian shoemakers including us and our dear friend and fellow shoemaker Grant Hunter (RIP) from Far out Footwear. We were fortunate to get a tour of the archives of the museum where we were overwhelmed by centuries of shoes in their collection. I remember being close to tears, wearing white gloves and handling shoes from the 1600s and earlier.

The pair of Pendragon shoes they acquired was the Prince of Autumn Leaves from our 1994 exhibition “Metamorphosis”. Made from individual leather leaf panels, embossed and hand-dyed, they were a men’s boot style, inspired by Oberon from Midsummer Night’s Dream.

There was a fabulous launch party at the museum and a publication to boot called “Stepping Out – Three Centuries of Shoes”.

May 7, 2021August 20, 2021

History of Pendragon year by year – 1996

In 1996 as its name suggests, “Visions of the Absurd in the Age of Reason” was a whimsical and rather eccentric exhibition. It included about 15 largely unwearable shoes and boots that fitted into the theme “the Age of Reason”…that period in the 1800s known for its discoveries and inventions. Some of the featured exhibits were prototypes of a fictional failed serial inventor Arthur Crump (wheel boot and “one size fits all” and a series of shoe animal specimens from Charles Darwin’s personal collection. These were later to influence his theory in “On the Origin of Footwear”. There were also nods to Lewis Carroll (teapot boot sole inscribed with the Mad Hatter’s Tea Party prose about the dormouse), and Salvador Dali (boot with drawers).

We staged a full costume arts ball with live acts from a string of performing artists, an absurd orchestra and a kissing booth! This was held at the Zoo nightclub in the Valley in Brisbane. A truly wonderful evening!

Christine Johnstone performing at the Visions Art Ball

April 16, 2021August 23, 2021

History of Pendragon year by year – 1995

Here’s a little dose of Brisbane history, in the bygone era of the 90s, Brisbane Riverside housed numerous bars, one of which was the dramatically titled Grand Orbit. Once a month they hosted fashion parades that were focused on showcasing local labels, an opportunity we seized.

We created a trifecta of sets of shoes, the singular, unifying theme of them all: colourful and flashy. We have video but the photos on the night weren’t great….too much smoke machine on stage!

The photoshoots afterwards were great though. Photographed by Ros Baynes of Tea Party Portraits (still going in Brisbane).

Space Patrol: Pulp Sci-fi inspired and with all the flair. Suede boots with spacey symbols and matching vests.

Bug: Jitterbug (Black and White), Stinkbug (purple and green)and Toadstool (Red and white). Unfortunately only the Black and white photos survived.

Purrr: Suede platform zip up boots with sheepskin fur cuffs.

Space boots — Space Patrol 1995 photographed near the Gasworks Newstead by Ros Baynes

bug shoes and bag — Bug shoes photoshoot New Farm park – photographed by Ros Baynes

Bug shoes — Bug photoshoot New Farm park – photographed by Ros Baynes

Purrr boots — Purrr photographed at Teneriffe
by Ros Baynes

Later that year we made boots for a photoshoot at the Ashton circus, again photographed by Ros Baynes.

Ring master boots — 1995 Astons circus Ringmaster photoshoot by Ros Baynes

Ashton Circus photoshoot featuring circus boots. Photographed by Ros Baynes

April 8, 2021

The History of Pendragon year by year – 1994

This year saw us making our very first exhibition! Metamorphosis. The nature themed pieces we created this year very much set the tone for our future work. At the centre of this exhibition were the 5 sculptural shoes representing the stages of the life of the shoe. The first three were inspired by the life cycle of a caterpillar: pupa, chrysalis, adult butterfly, then, slightly straying from caterpillars, the rather grim demise was fashioned after the appearance of Cicadas on tree trunks. This was the death of the shoe. Then, by absolute happenstance, Adrian stumbled upon a phoenix theme, so rather than succumb to mortality, we bookended the series with the arisen phoenix

Bankrolled by an Arts Queensland Grant, we had the luxury of being able to toy and experiment with the shoe as an art form, drawing out and focusing on organic shapes and forms. That playfulness of form and shape wasn’t purely aesthetic, we made technical breakthroughs with leather dying, embossing and moulding- as showcased by our “Prince of Autumn Leaves”, “metamorphosis 4, Drought and “Shoes of the Gods”. We experimented with wood carving heels and draped them in exotic skins.

The pieces were performed at a beautiful inner-city ball room in Elizabeth Street Brisbane, choreographed by our dear friend Alex. Each pair of our creations was worn onstage with costumes and props (one memorable prop was a fully grown carpet snake wrangled by the lovely Tonia). We then toured it to Cairns for a display at the iconic Crackerbox Palace store. (Which is still there!)

Metamorphosis has a twofold meaning for us: the embodiment of the nature theme, but also our evolution artistically and technically.

Other creations in this exhibition included the Harvest boots, Mermaid Shoes Redback Spider shoes and Temptation.