This is Paris, a capital of fashion and home to many of the most adored shoe designers,
including Christian Louboutin, the man behind the iconic red-lacquered sole.
Since 1991 in this compact studio in the heart of the city, Louboutin has created his cabaret-inspired designs,
from sexy stilettos to fancy footwear, creations that are sought-after by some of the world's most recognized names
and immortalized in pop culture with this Jennifer Lopez song.
And despite his shoes selling for $400 and up, it's not just celebrities who admire and wear his scarlet soles.
Because they're sexy and they're fun and they're stylish.
Absolutely great shoes. I mean, really nice, very colorful, very comfortable, you know? Even with such high heels.
He's really known for the famous red sole and the shoes are very sexy and empowering to women because they're very comfortable and the silhouette is very elegant.
This week, Talk Asia's in Hong Kong with Christian Louboutin, who tells us why he thinks comfort isn't everything.
Most of us ignore the soles of our shoes, right? It's the thing that touches the ground. We pay no attention to it.
What on earth gave you the idea to make the soles red?
So, one of the shoe[s] I started was called Pensee.
So, it was a high-heel pump, pointy, with a big Mary Jane over it, big flower outline, in different colors.
Looking at the drawing, something was better on the drawing. And I could really not... I could not figure out what was better in the drawing.
I had the drawing here, and I had the shoe there, and I was looking at it like that. And it looked really the same.
And then, at one point, I turn it like this. And this was all black. It was a big, big mass of black, which [did not exist] on my drawings.
And I [had] a girl in Italy who was trying on the shoe. And so, she was sitting next to me and she was not trying any shoe at this point. And she was painting her nails.
So I grab her nail polish, and then I painted. I painted the sole. And it made it feel like, um...
It popped.
It popped. Like a revelateur, we say in French. It really popped. And it was exactly my draw[ing].
And I thought, well, this is as simple as that. It's really a matter of color. So I thought, well, every season, I'm going to have a colored sole.
And then... but then what happened immediately after, the first season I did a red sole and immediately it became a signature.
I can't help it. These are outrageous, but how can a foot be comfortable in this? Is it possible?
It is possible. You know, you cannot be comfortable [in] high-heel shoes the way you would be in sneakers. But, you know, not everyone wants to be [in] sneakers.
And sneakers are for different purposes.
Saying that, it's not the height of the heel which gives you the idea if you are going to be comfortable or not, because this heel is 16 centimeters.
But [when] you actually are walking, the foot is arched on a 10 centimeters.
And this is how your foot is arched [in] the shoe, which is going to give the actual possible comfort or [not].
Any podiatrist is gonna look at this and say, "No. This is dangerous for your foot."
Do you worry about that? I mean, when a woman sees this, they think, "Oh, it's so beautiful."
But, for me, it would be like, "It's very nice, but it'll stay here and I'll look at it, but I don't think I could function in those."
A lot of people can function. Do not worry.