A Marriage Of One Foot In Front Of The Other

Some companies have been born by working partnerships, while others have been formed by marriage. For example, William Fortnum, a footman in Queen Anne’s household, partnered with his landlord, Hugh Mason, to open a grocery shop. From humble beginnings came the very high-end store Fortnum & Masons. Likewise, when George Bromley married Elizabeth Russell in 1873, the two families came together to create one store, the renowned footwear company Russell & Bromley. Find out more here in A Marriage Of One Foot In Front Of The Other

This family business is still a family business.  Founded when George Bromley, a shoemaker, married Elizabeth, the daughter of Albion Russell, whose family had been in the shoe business since 1820. Their first store was in Eastbourne, and by the turn of the new century, it had expanded, including a move to Bromley, Kent in 1905. The family still runs the brand in this new century. As of 2025, a new Creative Director, Daniel Beardsworth-Shaw, has joined the company, his job to refine, to work the the already magnificent heritage of the house.

Daniel’s career spans the full breadth of luxury & retail, where he has led design and product development at British heritage brand Hunter and popular sportswear brand Sweaty Betty, along with a significant tenure with British designer Christopher Raeburn at his eponymous RTW and accessories label.

Russell & Bromley is known for its grounding in British heritage craft and artisanal techniques, we asked Daniel to give .Cent an exclusive selection of shoes from his first collection, for A/W 25 that he feels carries the weight of the brand, at the same time bringing ideas forward to make these designs fresh and modern for current high fashion styling. This move to having design in-house is a first in its 140-year history.

“The process of making a shoe is a true labour of love and can be a very lengthy process. It starts with your design inspiration, which is often centred around one specific element”.

“It could be a certain toe shape or a specific heel height that will be a defining factor. Taking that design into consideration, the last process can then begin. The last is the form that your shoe is built around. This requires highly skilled last makers (we work with artisans in Italy) to craft your first sample. After that, you can then start the rigorous fitting stage. It can take up to one year to develop, if not longer”. 

“The below styles are a strong representation of how we have brought in a modern design language that is influenced by our past collections and rich archive”.

“Starting with our Chester loafer that we’ve been crafting for more than 60 years, we took the Counter shape from the heel to centre our new design language around. The curve of the Counter can be found throughout the women’s wear collection to celebrate our most iconic style”.

Our Chester loafers have been made up in various fabrications throughout the year, so we wanted to bring that back for AW25 with bold combinations of grape ponyhair and silver lizard (faux)”.

“In the Haymoor Tall, you can see the interesting heel shape, which is one that we’ve lifted straight from our archive and woven into a new family range for AW25. The Birchwood boot is also something that we’ve pulled from the archive – I found a small hand drawing in there with these beautiful wave lines that we’ve used on this modern western boot. I loved that the lines weren’t symmetrical”.

“Staying with the western trend, our festival boot has been extremely popular over the years, and I wanted to bring back a traditional slouchy style with a few fresh updates, which you can see in our Radmore styles”.

Finally, our newly introduced Totter family, which we launched last year, has been designed for AW25 in a bold monochrome croc (faux).

We have a strong history with exotic skin prints; we actually produced a whole collection of croc (faux) in the 1940s. So, I’ve always been very keen to bring this back to our current-day collections.

We at .Cent finally asked the designer what luxury means to him.

“Whether I’m shopping for myself or creating for our customer, luxury is all centred around quality and craft. For me, that means spending quality time in my studio at home, creating and designing”.

See the new S/S collection and find out all you want to know about RussellandBromley.co.uk here

If you enjoyed reading A Marriage Of One Foot In Front Of The Other, why not read Be The First To Drive Into The Future Here

.Cent magazine, London, Luxury Thinking