In the world’s 80 biggest cities, including Athens, Melbourne, Paris, Prague, Seoul, Sofia and Tokyo, a unique Russian product is on sale, ballet pointe, or toe, shoes. The prestigious journal French Dance said that the only drawback of these Russian ballet shoes is that a ballerina cannot do without them if she tries them on but once. True, Svetlana Zakharova and Diana Vishneva, prima ballerinas of Moscow and St Petersburg, use only these pointe shoes. According to French Dance, at present, the dancewear from the Grishko Company in Russia is amongst the world’s best.
Almost 20 years ago, when private business in Russia was just emerging, Nikolai Grishko, an economist by education, got a piece 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 the structure and composition of ballet shoes used by stars of the past. By the way, he came to the conclusion that those shoes were very problematic. 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 an acoustics institute and a laboratory of starch products. As a result, a new model of pointe shoes was designed.
Nikolai Grishko gave us his viewpoint. “Our pointe shoes are durable. The secret lies in the glue used in making the toe box, the most solid part of pointe shoes. Seven layers of different fabrics are fastened together with special glue that we invented 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 model of ballet shoes produced in the world possess this characteristic. In addition, our craftsmen perform the most complicated operations manually”.
With pleasure, Nikolai Grishko remembered that during a foreign tour of the Moscow ballet, the Queen of Spain was asked what the toe boxes of ballet shoes are made of, what allows 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. 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! This is because a ballerina covers up to 11 kilometres (6.8 miles) during one performance. So, pointe shoes should be hard-wearing and very comfortable. This is the aim of the Grishko Company.
Nikolai Grishko said that the work to perfect pointe shoes continues. At present, four leading theatres of Russia are testing the latest model of pointe shoes, the tests are expected to end in September. The new model will be 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 a thing before.
27 May 2008
Tatiana Kaperkina
Voice of Russia World Service
http://www.ruvr.ru/main.php?lng=eng&q=27556&cid=62&p=27.05.2008 (in English)
