Charlotte Olympia

If you love a playful statement shoe, they tend to earn their keep. The Kitty flat, with its cat-face appliqué, is one of the brand's signatures and is built to last, with owners reporting wear over many years. They are pricey, but the design is genuinely iconic to the label, which is part of what holds their appeal.

The brand is positioned as luxury and the make reflects it, with carefully finished details and a polished hand. The aesthetic is built around old-Hollywood glamour rather than understatement, so you are paying for distinctive design as much as construction. For statement pieces, owners generally find them durable and worth keeping.

The price reflects luxury positioning, intricate signature details and a strong design identity rooted in 1940s and 50s Hollywood glamour. Pieces like the Perspex Pandora clutch and the Kitty flat are recognisable showpieces rather than basics, and that distinctiveness commands a premium. You are buying a design statement, not a plain accessory.

The label is best known for the island-platform Dolly pump, the Kitty flat and the Perspex Pandora clutch box. If you want one piece that captures the house, any of those three is a true signature.

Look at the sole. The brand's signature is a spider-web design placed under the shoe sole, a small but telling detail that runs across the line. Combined with the recognisable silhouettes like the Dolly platform and Kitty flat, it is a quick way to check you are holding the real thing.

The brand was founded in 2008 by Charlotte Olympia Dellal, right after she graduated from the London College of Fashion, where she studied product development and footwear. Her first footwear collection was presented during London Fashion Week in February 2008.

Yes. Charlotte Olympia is a British luxury shoe and accessories brand. Its first store opened on Maddox Street in London in 2010, followed by stores in New York and Los Angeles.

The designs draw on classical Hollywood cinema glamour, pin-ups and movie stars from the 1940s and 50s. That cinematic, retro-glamour sensibility is the thread that ties the Dolly pump, Kitty flat and Pandora clutch together, so the whole line feels like one playful, vintage-inspired world.

Although the label is primarily focused on footwear and accessories for women, it also produces a collection for little girls called Incy and the Tom Cat smoking slipper for men. So there is a small offering beyond the womenswear core.

The brand is the work of Charlotte Olympia Dellal, born in 1981 in Cape Town, South Africa, to a Brazilian model mother and a British property-developer father. Her sister is the model Alice Dellal, and the family's creative and glamorous background shows in the brand's spirit.

Yes, plenty. The label received NewGen sponsorship from the British Fashion Council in 2008, was named Emerging Designer of the Year at the 2010 Footwear News Achievement Awards, and won Accessory Designer of the Year at the British Fashion Awards more than once. That run of honours underlines its standing as a serious accessories house.

Owners generally report that the classic velvet Kitty flats run true to size with little need for a break-in period. As with any statement shoe, comfort varies by style, but the everyday flats are designed to be wearable, not just decorative. If you are between sizes, the velvet has a little give.