“Gray Matters”: architectural heels by shoe designer Silvia Avanzi

Italy, as everyone knows, is famous for many things: food, wines, culture, history, architecture, fashion. Shoe designer Silvia Avanzi has mixed the last two in an exceptional and unexpected way, giving birth to a line of heels that really wants to make women happy.

What Silvia describes as “a marketing-trained brain” has helped her to put on paper the concept of her shoes before everything else: “I asked myself, ‘What do women want today, and what do we need, really?’ We feel everything has been done and redone, and I’m not the type of person who simply wants women to spend money. I want her to be happy with her purchases.”

That is how her “avant-garde heels” took shape. The line, called Gray Matters offers sleek glove shoes, mules and flatforms and was first launched in New York stores in October.

After designing each of her heels personally, Silvia used a company in Le Marche region that works for worldwide famous brands such as Fendi, Dior and Missoni to create her shoes.

The shoe designer states, talking about her spring/summer 2017 collection: “I wanted to speak about confidence — a woman who’s so strong and powerful, and who can balance atop the most delicate thing you can think of”.

Gray Matter is the result of the genius from Veneto and the amazing craftsmanship from Le Marche and is set to become one of the most appreciated and luxurious lines of Italian shoes. The heels are nothing short but perfect, especially because Silvia put a lot of effort in finding the right partners to create them: “Finding a team of expert artisans in Italy willing to develop a comprehensive collection for an up-and-coming brand has been very time-consuming,” she says.

But what about the brand name? Silvia is almost scientific in her explanation: “I’ve heard many times that people associate ‘gray matter’ with something smart, which I don’t mind,” she says. “I think my shoes are very intelligent.”