Repetto (shoe brand)
Repetto is a French shoe brand based in Saint-Médard-d'Excideuil , founded in 1947. Repetto is the market leader for ballet shoes .
history
In 1947 Rose Repetto (* 1907 in Milan ; † 1984 in Paris ) founded the company with a small studio in Rue de la Paix near the Opéra National at the suggestion of her son Roland Petit , a dancer and choreographer of international renown de Paris . Rose Repetto developed ballet shoes that are particularly comfortable for the dancers to wear. In 1959 she opened her first boutique at 22 rue de la Paix in Paris. Numerous dancers became her customers: Maurice Béjart , Rudolf Noureev , Mikhail Baryshnikov and many more. The special thing about the production of the shoes is that the soles are worked upside down and then turned. So they have a special suppleness. In 1967 Rose Repetto moved production to Saint-Médard-d'Excideuil in the Dordogne department . Rose Repetto's shoes became known to a wide audience through Brigitte Bardot , who wore them in the film Et Dieu… créa la femme .
After the death of the founder, the company was taken over by the American company Esmark, which sold it to Banque populaire in 1988 . In 1998, Jean Marc Gaucher, former head of Reebok in France, took over the company that had been in decline for years.
Despite a bankruptcy in 2002, the new owner managed to position the company in the luxury segment and to orientate it internationally. The collaboration with well-known fashion brands such as Issey Miyake , Yōji Yamamoto and Comme des Garçons contributed significantly to this.
Products
The Repetto company, which has 350 employees in France, currently produces 450,000 pairs of shoes a year, 50% of which are exported.
Product range in 250 different colors:
literature
- Corinne Caillaud: La ballerine Repetto, l'autre perle du Périgord . In: Le Figaro , August 20, 2013, p. 22.
Web links
- Repetto website
- Biography of Rose Repetto (French, accessed August 25, 2013)