Inside E Nolan’s footwear capsule, made with Melbourne label L’Eclisse

“I knew that the E Nolan woman needed a shoe that was both timelessly beautiful and endlessly reliable.”

The older I get, the more certain I become of two things: that comfort is king, and investing in a pair of high-quality shoes is something you’ll never regret. Melbourne labels E Nolan and L’Eclisse have built their brands around these tenets, and Emily Nolan and John Rizzo, their respective founders, have an innate understanding of what makes for an enduring design.

John’s experience in the fashion industry runs the gamut from buying, sales and design, and he’s been the creative director of footwear label L’Eclisse for over six years. “L’Eclisse was born after I met my incredible technical collaborator, Roberta Tartuferi, while I was designing shoes for some of Australia’s biggest and most loved Australian fashion labels,” he tells us. Together, Roberta and John produce interesting, high-quality shoes that are “inherently uninterested in trends”.

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Meanwhile, Emily’s label has gone from strength to strength over the last few years, and her incredible Fitzroy atelier and dedicated customer base are a testament to her made-to-last designs (I wear one of her striped shirts several times a week, the fit is that good).

Longtime friends, both renowned in the Melbourne fashion scene for their dedication to craftsmanship and impeccable taste, last week they unveiled a collaborative range of footwear, L’Eclisse Pour E Nolan. With John bringing decades of expertise in the footwear realm and Emily knowing the E Nolan customer inside and out, they worked together to create four timeless, hardworking styles: a moccasin, low T-bar heel, pumps and flat slingbacks.

“I’m a tailor by trade but I love John, love shoes and I particularly love John’s shoes, so this collaboration has always been something I’ve wanted to do, it’s just been figuring out the right time for both of our businesses to pull the trigger,” she says. After a trip to John’s Armadale store, the duo realised they needed to, in Emily’s words, “make it happen immediately”. Below, they share why they’re drawn to each other’s work, how the range came to be and what sets it apart.

How did this collaboration come about? Have you been fans of each others’ work for some time or is it a more recent connection?

Emily: We’ve been in each other’s orbit for some time. In 2018 I was working in a boutique on High Street, Armadale next door to John’s first L’Eclisse shop, and on a lunch break spotted a pair of fuchsia pink boudoir slippers in his window. I popped in to try them on and we’ve been friends ever since.

I immediately saw much of myself and my own approach to design, construction and beauty in John’s work, and knew very quickly that what he was doing and creating was singular and unique, and born out of natural taste and talent, as all beautiful things are.

John: When it comes to Emily, she was a customer first but a friend very soon after. The things she admires in me and my work I quickly came to admire in her and hers, which is why this project feels so natural. She sees beauty as separate from fashion, something that stands the test of time. Emily takes her work, her craft and everything she does seriously, which is rare in this industry.

What vision did you have in mind when creating this range? Where were you both pulling inspiration from?

E: We came to this collaboration knowing that we both love and hate the same things: we share an admiration of beauty and a disgust for the state of common craftsmanship. And that’s always been more than enough to fuel us creatively, and this project was no exception. I knew we needed to create shapes that could be worn with suits, simply. But also the shoes needed to feel like E Nolan, with L’Eclisse construction and integrity.

J: The foundation of our friendship has always been so strong because we’re so aligned when it comes to our creative principles, so pulling together this range felt very organic. I guess the only divergence is in our customers. That’s not to say that there’s no overlap between mine and Emily’s clientele.

There is, but it’s not huge. Generally, I find the women of Armadale who shop at L’Eclisse tend to be loyal to this postcode, and Emily’s clientele shops around her atelier in Fitzroy. So we had to meet somewhere in the middle – creatively, that is.

This wasn’t difficult when we returned to the principles of design that we’ve always had in common. We discussed different silhouettes, being tempted by a design that was half suede, half silk, but making a shoe like that for the types of women Emily dresses is like putting a silk bumper bar on a car – it’s beautiful but not practical. I knew that the E Nolan woman needed a shoe that was both timelessly beautiful and endlessly reliable.

What makes these shoes special?

J: When it comes to the construction and fabrication of the shoe, these shoes, like all my shoes at L’Eclisse, have an amazing pedigree thanks to the relationship I have with my collaborator, Roberta Tartufi. Roberta is technically brilliant, and an unparalleled expert at building beautiful shoes.

Since inception, we’ve worked together to bring L’Eclisse designs to life in a way that means the shoes are able to be both true to the design in beauty and comfort. This range for E Nolan is no exception.

All L’Eclisse shoes are manufactured in Marche, northern Italy, where Roberta produces shoes for some of LVMH’s most esteemed brands. Roberta has access to not only the best leathers and suedes but is so technically strong that she knows how to make the most of the resources she has available to her. As far as I know, there’s no one producing original designs of such high quality anywhere else in Australia.

E: John’s relationship with Roberta and the access it gives our customers to such incredible quality is exceptional. And it doesn’t come at the compromise of comfort. For me, comfort is key, and good design is inherently comfortable. These shoes are just that – very kind to your feet!

This also mirrors what I am trying to celebrate in my own line, that when things fit well they look and feel the best. Just as at the end of an hour with me I hope that one of my clients leaves understanding what a good fit is, I want my customer to be able to appreciate this in John’s shoes too.

Slow fashion is important to both of you. How did these values manifest when creating this range?

E: I love what John Wildsmith said, that “You’re either in your bed or you’re in your shoes, so it pays to invest in both” and am passionate about the idea of wardrobe mementos. So I really believe in the idea that we should be willing to invest in building a wardrobe full of pieces that are crafted in a way that both helps you express yourself and can withstand the rigour of a busy life.

This means that the piece needs to be constructed in a way that has longevity. These shoes are designed to be with you for a lifetime, and I mean that when it comes to both construction but also a timeless sense of style. They’ll be wearable for a lifetime, too.

J: I think that what we’re doing is actually transcending slow fashion, and perhaps fashion itself. I tend to believe that fashion as a concept has run its course, having arrived at a point that’s loud, gauche and exists for wealthy people to signal their status.

Fashion seems to have lost its attachment to style and beauty, and is required to inhabit unnecessary movement to perpetuate and justify its existence. What we’re doing is separate from fashion; it’s timeless and will be endlessly relevant, because good design and construction is just that – enduring.

Take a Bauhaus building. When that building was constructed 100 years ago, it was fashionable and on-trend for the time. But the design principles are so strong, so elegant and so minded to the way we need and appreciate architecture as a form that its beauty stands the test of time. Applying those principles, the E Nolan x L’Eclisse range draws from naturally elegant shapes, textures that appear in the natural world and a colour that underpins all others.

This is all objectively stylish. This is also why in my store and in my design I champion design democracy. I design from intuition, instinct and diverse inspiration, and every shoe has its place. It’s up to the wearer to give it relevance, which means the shoe will always usurp a trend.

You can explore the L’Eclisse Pour E Nolan range here.