London Underground creative director Paul Kaufman

Paul Kaufman can’t tear himself away from London. Even though it’s been years since he introduced the States to his wholesale brand Na Na, Kaufman remains a Brit-inspired punk rocker at heart. His brand-new line of young women’s shoes, London Underground (part of the Dynasty family of brands), possesses a similar subcultural sensibility. Kaufman tells WSAToday.com, “With London Underground, depending on who the customer is, they can make it super hard-core or sweet and feminine.” The first fall ’07 shipment, with a retail range of $50 to $180, arrived in stores earlier this month. Below is an extended, Web-only version of our exclusive interview, which first appeared in our October issue.

What trends are hot right now, in terms of women’s footwear?

While everybody else was into transparency, I was into obscured transparency. It was part of an idea of doing things that aren’t the norm for us. A lot of people used metal and we used a lot as well, but I used liquid metal. There’s a revolution going on—in music, in fashion. The individual who I think is influencing it—that’s who we are. It’s not so much the designers. Designers can’t ignore what’s going on in the streets now because so much creativity is going on there.

Bumpin Crunch, new for spring '08

Tell us about your spring ’08 collection.

The shoes are really detail-oriented. I was actually surprised by how many high heels I did. It’s dress with attitude—not your mother’s pumps. Heel shapes are very different. I tried to give a very strong brand identity to the shoes, too, using the logo and a design element in a certain way consistently.

What were your design inspirations for spring ’08?

The Tower of London was a great inspiration overall. It was the inspiration for the logo. We picked a raven because in the 1500s, the King of England was told if the ravens ever flew away, the kingdom would fall. Other inspirations are nature, the Paris Revolution from ’67 to ’68 and even my appendicitis in March [an artistic rendering of Kaufman’s appendix shows up as an outsole print on of one of the shoes]. It was an interesting experience.

Describe your customer to us. Who is she?

I think that she is a very independent individual who’s not afraid to make a statement with her shoes or her clothing. She listens to any music that isn’t really pop or mainstream.

Kaufman predicts menswear influences will be big next fall.

What makes your brand different from other women’s brands?

I think that to be successful as a brand you have to create a niche. The main thing I learned with Na Na is that the only way to compete is to be different. We have very similar economic conditions as we did in the ’90s. But my business was growing 60 percent a year. If you have something people want, it doesn’t really matter [what the economy is like]. There’s some similarities in terms of that climate. When business is bad, if we establish [the brand] now, when the climate improves the brand will get even better.

There’s a lot of subtext with London Underground. We try to give it a lot of meaning because a brand really has to stand for something. To me, I picked the elements I thought it should represent and thought about the individual who would be buying the shoes. We reflect that individual’s taste in music, art, fashion, design. We want to be part of their tribe, their family. It’s the concept of having something long-term as opposed to a quick fix. [Fashion] is a merry-go-round anyway; you have to constantly research and travel to get what you want.

How do you strengthen your relationships with buyers and retailers?

We hope that the people who buy our shoes have the same connection with their customers. To us, everyone is an individual, although that’s kind of any oxymoron. We’ll build this brand a person at a time. I’m not afraid of that. Our team includes all of our retailers as well. I think it really boils down to trust. Can they have trust in you? That you can deliver on time? That you can have comfort and style? It’s important to get people physically with a product to get them to have a positive physical reaction. It’s a visceral thing. If you can do that, they’ll come back and trust you.

Knee Slap, from the spring '08 collection

What are buyers telling you?

We had a very good response. We had some people come in and say this is it, this is great. We’re offering an antidote to sameness. We tended to hear that the people with more difficulties in their retailing are bigger retail stores. Most of the independents we talked to were upbeat about their business. They’re more niche-driven. It keeps them ahead of the big stores. It’s the same thing for us. People are saying we need something different because everybody looks the same.

What have been some of your biggest challenges?

For me, in a nutshell, that’s all design is—solving problems. The shoe business is particularly difficult; you always have to think and you’re always in solution mode and that’s pretty exciting. I decided at some point I really wanted to focus on shoes. When I made the transition from Na Na it was into designing shoes as much as I could. For me, shoes are great—they sort of fill all the aspects of what I’m inspired by. Footwear is all about architectural, graphics-involved, design solutions.

Strike A Pose, new for spring '08

What other designers do you admire?

There are a lot of people I think are great. Anybody able to maintain their vision, given all the pressures there are in footwear, I can admire. With all these pressures and minimums involved I have a lot of admiration for those people who are successful. I think anybody who can continue to be creative on a regular basis is admirable. It’s much easier for a bigger brand to come out with shoes. I wan to give a shout out to those smaller brands.

If you could change something about the industry, what would it be?

I’d love to slow down the cycles of change. The trends are artificially shortened to sell more product. We could make lots of shoes but it’s kind of wasteful and people don’t need that much. It creates a situation where shoes are undervalued. Consumers get confused and don’t know what to buy. I would also hope that originality would be protected and valued more. Legally, it’s not well-protected. Protection is more in the hands of people who can keep you in court.

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