As anyone who’s ever run out to get the paper in bare feet on a cold morning knows, shoes are a brilliant (and necessary) invention. People have been fascinated by footwear since the beginning of recorded history. The Greek god Mercury wore winged sandals (who doesn’t want a pair of those?) and childhood fairy tales involving shoes abound: Cinderella, Puss in Boots, the Seven League Boots, the Little Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe, not to mention Dorothy and her ruby slippers. Here’s a brief timeline of shoe highlights throughout history.
In China, the thousand-year-long practice of foot-binding begins.
Anglo-Saxon brides hand a pair of shoes to their groom rather than exchanging rings.
The poulaine, a shoe with
very, very, very long toes,
takes the upper classes by
storm. By the mid-1400s,
the toes are so elongated
that they’re stuffed with
moss to keep their shape
and sometimes tied to the
ankle or even the
knee with cord. »
The extremely short Catherine de Medici wears one of the first pairs of raised high heels to dazzle the French court.
Shoelaces as we know them are first recorded in England. (But metal eyelets aren’t invented until the 1820s!)
Shoemakers begin making separate lasts for left and right feet; up until then, shoes could be worn on either foot.
The vulcanization of Keds are marketed
rubber allows the invention as the very first
of rubber-soled plimsolls “sneakers.” Converse
for badminton and starts producing its All
tennis. Star line the same year.
Ferdinand and Imelda
Marcos flee a revolution
in the Philippines. Imelda
is discovered to own
1,060 pairs
of shoes,
putting
a face on
shoe
addicts
every-
where. »
Supermodel Naomi Campbell falls on the catwalk wearing a 9" pair of Vivienne Westwood platforms.
An Australian mathematician finally discovers the most efficient way to tie your shoelaces.
Online retailers allow customers to customize shoe designs, and new cobblers open up shop for the first time in decades.
References:
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