“Shoes are very important,” says Jimmy Choo, beadily studying my heavy-duty biker boots. “If you’re not comfortable, you spoil your body, and your spine will not be straight. A lot of people don’t walk straight when they walk – they don’t wear shoes nicely.”
The debonair shoe designer, whose super-sparkly creations have been worn by everyone from British royalty to Hollywood stars, would know all about the importance of good footwear. Dressed in a characteristically exuberant jewel-toned jacket and crystal-embellished midnight-blue brogues of his own design, he is chatting in a light-filled room of the recently restored Boston Manor House in the leafy west London suburb of Brentford, Hounslow, where he is opening a new “makerspace” for emerging craftspeople and designers. According to the Red List of Endangered Crafts published by the Heritage Crafts Association…