I am back! From my August R&R, that is. Well, sort of. I will come back with more content next week, but today I am trying to nail down some details of my daughter’s recent engagement and future wedding festivities. Fun, fun, fun, but makes blogging a little more of a challenge. However, be of good faith. You, my trusted blogger crowd, will not get lost in the shuffle. I will just have to shuffle a little faster this year!
Today, however, I must give you an update on a recent decision in the legal action brought by luxury shoe brand Christian Louboutin against design house Yves Saint Laurent for trademark protection for the Louboutin famed lacquered red bottoms. The “bottom line”—sorry, but I could not resist—is that the Louboutin soles are protected on all of its footwear except for the shoes with red uppers as well as lowers—“monochromatic” according to the decision. Who knew that judges on the US Appeals Court in Manhattan could get so into shoes to be that precise! Specifically, the Court found that the contrasting red bottom is “an identifying mark firmly associated with” the Louboutin brand. So, both design houses are declaring victory because YSL can continue to produce shoes with red uppers and red soles.
You may recall—-sure you do ‘cuz we women live for this stuff!—that last year a lower court in NY dismissed Louboutin’s request for a temporary injunction to prevent YSL from selling red-soled shoes that resembled those in the Louboutin product line. The recent decision sent the case back to the lower court without issuing the injunction.
All of you who are proud owners of Louboutins can heave a sigh of relief. Your good taste and shoes—-as long as they are not red all over—are protected from confusion with the lower-priced spread. Is that true? Are the YSL shoes lower priced? I think so, but clearly I do not get out enough. I will have to rely on my lawyer-daughter and her crowd to straighten me out on that.
After you heave that sigh of relief, please take a minute to explain to me how you can afford either of those shoe brands on a starting lawyer’s salary and repayment of school loans. I am all ears! E-Bay I presume—and that is a good thing!
Maybe the latter issue—the school loans—is something that the courts and the ABA and anyone else who can be enlisted should address with dispatch. In the long run, it is a lot more important to all of you than shoes. Really!
But…………I do love shoes!
For more on Louboutin vs. YSL, see http://ms-jd.org/san-francisco-cocktail-benefit-gl.
