In previous posts we saw the last trends on 2017 runways: stripes and block-heels. We stay to speak about the further two: pearls and mules. Here I would like to rest on pearl-heels.

Throughout the most recent runways many shoe-designers suggested this item for SS2017. According with my love for pearls both in jewelry and in clothes, you can easily understand my interest in this post. Let start from some examples: Casadei and Nicholas Kirkwood ( designers already mentioned in posts, respectively, 0.2 and 0.8) "weared" our SS2017 with pearl-heels, no matter if pencil or block ones rather than into plateau or in the plantar arch. 

To be honest, this trending item walked on Gucci runways already last year. It's anyway in this season that many designers focused their attention on this chic evergreen feature, still including Gucci. Other designers, like Sophia Webster and her Rosalind sandal (495$) as well as Cristian Louboutin with his Cataconico espadrille (795$), inspired to these gemstones for their last collections. For what concerns Nicholas' Kirkwood footwear, this item seems developing further the following patent of this brand: US D740,010 (October 2015) titled "The ornamental design for a heel with studs, as shown and described". 

This "escamotage" by shoe-designers can revolutionize the spreading idea that pearls belongs to chic-rich old women. Recently pearls have been put on clothes giving them that "quid" enough to be unique meanwhile casual-chic. Having now put them on heels of different types of footwear (from heels to boots and boyfriend shoes) can even more change our common thinking about this hard object produced within the soft tissue (specifically the mantle) of a living shelled mollusk or another animal, such as a conulariid. Stating that the majority of pearls as ornament to shoes may be factory-produced, here below I would like to briefly introduce this to-me-amazing gemstone. 

Just like the shell of a clam, a pearl is composed of calcium carbonate (mainly aragonite or a mixture of aragonite and calcite) in minute crystalline form, which has been deposited in concentric layers. The ideal pearl is perfectly round and smooth, but many other shapes, known as baroque pearls (my favoruite ones), can occur. The finest quality natural pearls have been highly valued as gemstones and objects of beauty for many centuries. Because of this, pearl has become a metaphor for something rare, fine, admirable and valuable.

Whether wild or cultured, gem-quality pearls are almost always nacreous and iridescent, like the interior of the shell that produces them. However, almost all species of shelled mollusks are capable of producing pearls (technically "calcareous concretions") of lesser shine or less spherical shape. Although these may also be legitimately referred to as "pearls" by gemological labs and also under U.S. Federal Trade Commission rules, and are formed in the same way, most of them have no value except as curiosities.

Sources: Wikipedia