A shoe is com­posed main­ly of three parts: the sole, the heel and the upper, cov­er­ing the top of the foot. The art of shoe design is to jug­gle with these three ele­ments to cre­ate unique pieces viz., shoes. Kendrick, a UTC grad­u­ate, has also patient­ly assem­bled very dif­fer­ent ele­ments through­out his pro­fes­sion­al life to obtain his cre­ation today: his own shoe brand, which is already mak­ing a name for itself.

The base-line, or sole, of Kendrick’s pro­fes­sion­al life is his engi­neer­ing degree in mechan­i­cal sys­tems, obtained in 1998. Entre UV de design et par­cours asso­ci­atif, il Between CC design and com­mu­ni­ty work, he is already begin­ning to real­ize that cre­ativ­i­ty is a vital neces­si­ty. But before he could take his thoughts any fur­ther, his mil­i­tary ser­vice caught up with him and sent him to Mex­i­co, as an inter­na­tion­al vol­un­teer in a com­pa­ny for Valéo. A bru­tal uproot­ing, from which he will come back with two per­son­al assets: an enhanced tal­ent for pho­tog­ra­phy, which he will even use in a trav­el guide, and a fas­ci­na­tion, fed by his dis­tance from France, for a fan­ta­sized image of the Parisian woman in high heels. 

The heel is a ver­tig­i­nous heel, of course, for the man who col­lects the most diverse lines on his CV. As a fash­ion pho­tog­ra­ph­er, he goes to fash­ion weeks and red car­pet events. As a web design­er, he worked on the devel­op­ment of dig­i­tal plat­forms for the dai­ly news­pa­per Le Figaro. As an entre­pre­neur, he bought a com­pa­ny that pro­duces styling soft­ware, which is sold world­wide to large groups. An eclec­tic CV, but dom­i­nat­ed by Kendrick’s pas­sion for fash­ion and aesthetics. 

If the sole and the heel are good, it’s now time to dress the foot, to cre­ate the shoe that will sub­li­mate the per­son wear­ing it. Devel­op­ing his own mod­els is exact­ly what Kendrick has been think­ing about for years. His dual back­ground as an engi­neer and a fash­ion pho­tog­ra­ph­er allowed him to think about shoes dif­fer­ent­ly, and to launch into the cre­ation of his first pro­to­type. With­out any train­ing as a shoe­mak­er, but with a deep desire, after years of work­ing in the dig­i­tal world, to find a man­u­al activ­i­ty. And a first pair was born. A sim­ple, unclut­tered san­dal that caught the eye of cer­tain design­ers. And in addi­tion to tak­ing pride of place in trendy Parisian bou­tiques, they end­ed up on the feet of tele­vi­sion pre­sen­ters or stars on the same red car­pets he walked as a fash­ion photographer. 

After the san­dal, boots, ankle boots and pumps fol­lowed, always in the same straight­for­ward colours (red, yel­low, black, nude) and with the same con­cern for a sim­ple and ultra-ele­gant line. As his brand began to make a name for itself in the fash­ion world, Kendrick the engi­neer quick­ly became Kendrick the shoe design­er. To facil­i­tate this tran­si­tion, he fol­lowed a train­ing course at the French Fash­ion Insti­tute, «l’Incubateur», to devel­op his brand. A project that already seems to be off to a good start and on the right footing!