Can you really make DIY Louboutins?

My fingers are covered in bright red paint, bits of glue are dotted up my arms, and I’ve got so many metallic studs littering the table and the floor, it looks like the aftermath of an unfortunate incident between a gang of Hell’s Angels and a very powerful magnet.

But I don’t care, because sitting in front of me is a beautiful pair of shoes that are a dead ringer for this season’s most sought-after Christian Louboutin heels. And, best of all, they’ve cost me a fraction of the real deal.

Louboutins and their iconic red soles have become the red carpet shoe of choice for A-listers including Victoria Beckham, Nicole Kidman and Sarah Jessica Parker. As a result, they also rank highly on the wish list of many style-savvy women.

But with prices starting at ￡375 for the basic Pigalle court shoe, they’re beyond the reach of most of us.

When times are tough, however, we Brits can be incredibly resourceful. During World War II, when women couldn’t get their hands on stockings, they bathed their legs in tea and used eyeliner to draw seams down the backs of their legs.

Flash forward 70 years, and if we can’t afford designer label shoes, we’re faking them ourselves. At least that’s what Homebase reckon. Last week, the DIY chain revealed that sales of tester pots of red paint had soared 40 per cent in the past year as cash-strapped fashion fans have decided to transform their High Street buys into designer lookalikes, employing the simple trick of painting the soles scarlet.

Louboutin’s red soles were first showcased in 1992 when, backstage at a show, Christian saw an assistant painting her fingernails a bright red and decided to use it to varnish the soles of his stilettos.

‘It happened by accident as I felt that the shoes lacked energy,’ he recalled. ‘So I applied red nail polish to the sole of a shoe. This was such a success that it became a permanent fixture.’
Success is something of an understatement. The company’s annual revenue is in excess of ￡160million, and an estimated 340,000 pairs are sold each year. Every pair comes with soles in a shade known to those in the trade as Pantone-18 Chinese Red.

And Louboutin goes to great lengths to protect these unique soles. In 2008, he sued High Street chain Zara for selling a pair of red-soled slingbacks which, he claimed, were too similar to his.

But last month a French court ruled that there was no way the shoes could be confused and dismissed the case. Last year, another case was brought against Yves Saint Laurent, which is still ongoing.