The Bite Magazine - Spring/Summer 2022 - Issue 31

bitemen Cristina Lloyd discovers Blackstock &Weber founder Chris Echevarria, crowned ‘Loafer Maestro’ after revolutionising the traditionally formal loafer shoe. T aking the name of the two roads he and his grandmother lived and grew up on, Chris Echevarria founded Brook- lyn-based fashion and lifestyle brand Blackstock & Weber in 2018. He revealed he had aspirations to work in the fashion industry since he was three. The New Jersey native residing in New York started his brand in the living room of his apartment. With assistance from Techstars LA, which invests in startups, Echevarria has a team spread across Los Angeles, Berlin and New York City. His free-thinking approach takes inspirational cues from travel, music, culture, art and pho- tography, which he applies to everyday objects with a grounded appreciation for traditional menswear. Having started at the J. Crew Liquor Store while studying menswear design at the Fashion Institute of Technology, Echevarria was selected by CEO Mickey Drexler to assist in col- laboration scouting on a corporate level. He then worked as a menswear trend forecaster and strat- egy/design with brands like Stone Island. A person who seeks to change the rules, Echevar- ria saw a lot of Sperry boat shoes growing up in the West Orange suburbs but wanted to differ- entiate himself from those who wore them. His favourite loafers were the Bass Weejun in Bor- deaux. “When you don’t choose a black or brown, and you choose the Bordeaux, it gives you a lot of options as far as colour play is concerned,” he told Hyperbeast. “It also teaches you that a shoe doesn’t necessarily have to be black or brown for you to work it into an outfit.” Initially, he sold 20 different types of shoes rang- ing fromChelsea boots to combat boots, but they were not footwear he wore himself, so he recon- sidered his options. Echevarria decided to focus on loafers; however, he found the traditional footwear too rigid and needed evolution. Thus, he added creative touches such as pony hair fab- rications and Goodyear-welted or Vibram 1757 soles. “With the loafer, you have three different silhouettes: the penny, tassel and horsebit.” He explained that the Penny loafer shoe and the sole were flat and not wide enough. “It didn’t have a presence at the end of your outfit, and I always wanted a shoe that had a presence at the end of your outfit,” he shared with Hyperbeast. “One of the shoes that I based this on was my favourite sneaker, the Air Force One. Not just from the shape and silhouette perspective, but I thought about it in the same aspect that if you look at the Air Force One, it goes from all-white to every colour and fabrication you can think of.” For the Ellis loafer collaboration with J. Crew and his other designs, Echevarria aimed to restruc- Loafer Maestro Blackstock Weber &

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