Like the craft industries of many countries, traditional Russian hand-made goods and their makers have dwindled, replaced by manufactured substitutes, some made in Russia and many imported from parts east. Passport made a visit to one, not only surviving, but thriving Moscow workshop to watch busy hands at work on products that have a worldwide demand.

Nikolay Grishko

Finishing boots for ethnic dance

Ballet, a cultural icon of Russia, has long been one of the country’s finest exports, whether through the tours of its great ballet companies to stages across the globe or the starring roles if its dance greats in other of the world’s great dance companies. Lesser known but no lesser stars of the international ballet world are the productions of Grishko, one of the world’s three leading producers of dance shoes, costumes and other dance accessories. A visit to the small Grishko boutique just off Tverskaya is an essential stop for visiting dancers and knowledgeable dance buffs to find the company’s hand-made ballet shoes as well as other wares produced by dozens of master-crafts persons in workshops around the city.

Nikolay Grishko is still at the helm of the company he founded by in the late 1980s as a manufacturing cooperative after he observed an interesting phenomenon when he accompanied his professional dancer-wife Tamara during a French tour: Russian dancers were bringing ballet shoes from theatre workshops at home to sell to European dancers. Grishko consolidated a number of the master shops and gave master workers employment during the difficult economic transition of the 1990s. At first the company copied older shoe models but Grishko realised that even for classical dance, new dance techniques and movements required new design. The old models were too rigid for modern dance. The company developed and used new technologies and design yet retained hand production.

Grishko pointes and ballet slippers are still handmade in their own workshops. Grishko says that “pointe shoes must be handmade and well fitted since even a small defect can cause injury for strenuous professional dancers. Also, the dancer should feel the soul of the shoemaker in the shoes.” Grishko tap shoes also have a solid reputation, not surprising since wife Tamara is a tap dancer herself. Other shoe styles include folk and Flamenco. Most of the Grishko workshops have now been consolidated into one location in eastern Moscow.

Pointe shoes in process

Dance wear workshop

Costumes are another Grishko specialty, not only for dance school students, but for some of the world’s best dance companies as well as professional figure skaters and theatre casts. The company has a workshop of highly skilled designers and seams-masters that work with luxurious and colourful fabrics to decorate a performer from head to toe.

Nikolay Grishko’s office is filled with the mementos of Russian dance he has collected as a patron of the art of dance. He has received numerous awards including a Diaghilev Memorial Silver Medal, the Vaslav Nijinsky International Memorial Medal and a Golden Mask Award among others.

One of my students mother Halinka, makes beautiful fairies and more to fund her daughters dancing, Have a look as they are absolutely enchanting.

TRYING ON RUSSIAN BALLET POINTE SHOES

Tags: Culture

May 27, 2008 15:06 Moscow Time

In the world’s 80 biggest cities, including Athens, Melbourne, Paris, Prague, Seoul, Sofia and Tokyo, there are on sale Russian unique produce—ballet pointe, or toe, shoes.

The French Dance journal says that the only drawback of those ballet shoes is that a ballerina cannot do without them if she tries them on but once. True, prima ballerinas of Moscow and St. Petersburg, Svetlana Zakharova and Diana Vishneva, use only those pointe shoes. According to the prestigious French Dance journal, at present the Russian “Grishko” company producing dancewear is among the world’s leaders.

Almost 20 years ago when private business in Russia was just emerging Nikolai Grishko, economist by education, got a peace of advice from his wife, a dancer, to start a company producing ballet pointe shoes. The would-be businessman took a serious approach to the matter: he studied structure and composition of ballet shoes used by stars of the previous years. By the way, he came to the conclusion that those shoes were most inconvenient. He compared them with sharp-nosed birds adding that a woman cannot stand on her toes having such pointe shoes on. He consulted scientists of six research institutes, including acoustics institute and a laboratory of starch products. As a result, a new model of pointe shoes was designed. Here is Nikolai Grishko’s opinion of it.

“Our pointe shoes are durable. The secret lies in the glue used in making the toe box, solid part of pointe shoes. Seven layers of different fabrics are glued with a special glue which we worked out and make ourselves. Other characteristics of the model are flexibility, elasticity and stability. We can put those pointe shoes on a table and they will stand balancing. No other models of ballet shoes produced in the world possess this characteristic. In addition, most complicated operations our craftsmen fulfill by hand.”

With pleasure Nikolai Grishko recalls that during a foreign tour of the Moscow ballet Queen of Spain was offered a puzzle what toe boxes of the ballet shoes are made of allowing a ballet dancer to stand on her toes. The queen came up with numerous ideas but failed to guess that it is only fabric and glue. And here is another question. What do you think, how many pairs of shoes a ballerina needs for one performance? The answer is impressive—five pairs! Since a ballerina covers the distance of up to 11 kilometers during one performance. So, pointe shoes should be hard-wearing and most comfortable. And this is the aim of the “Grishko” company.

Nikolai Grishko says that the work to perfect pointe shoes continues. At present four leading theatres of Russia are testing the latest model of the pointe shoes, the tests are expected to end in September. The new model will be by 30 percent lighter than the previous ones. It will be even more elegant and durable. In addition, the shoes will be practically noiseless. That is, they have incorporated all best characteristics of different models of pointe shoes. No one managed to do such thing before.

Tatyana Kaperkina

Grishko Ltd. was one of the participants at the special forum in Moscow dedicated to the employment of disabled persons in the capitol of Russia. Grishko’s exhibition stand with large variety of products that was demonstrated within the framework of the forum aroused intense interest from the participants of the Forum and media. Everyone was surprised at the fact that many of these masterpieces were created by disabled persons. One of them, Ruslan Adelshin, was present at this forum where he conducted a master-class on creating the famous Grishko pointe shoes.

CONTACT DETAILS for Appointments or Shoes

.....E-mail: pointeshoefitting@me.com

Telephone 07810803996