Mar 23, 2021
Image: Stiletto heel - clipartpanda.com
Whether we're talking about a sparkling new pair of Jimmy Choo stilettos or red-bottom Christian Louboutins, high heels will likely never go out of style according to hermoments.com. The shoes survived countless fashion eras and fads, solidifying themselves as permanent closet staples. But most people don't know the complicated history of the shoe — and it will knock your kitten heels right off.
Practical Origins
We're sure you've seen Lady Gaga strut in the wackiest ten-inch heels (she was particularly a fan of Alexander McQueen's lobster claw heels). But heels weren't invented with the intention of serving pop culture or fashion. Their purpose was much more practical.
Giddy-up!
While some say heels originated in ancient Egypt, the more traditional high-heeled shoe dates back to the Persian Empire circa the 10th century. The Persian cavalry used this style to keep their feet in their stirrups, especially when they needed to stand up and utilize their weapons. But this was just the beginning.
Women in Heels
You may be wondering, when did women first slip their puppies into pairs of high-heeled shoes? Well, that wasn't until the mid-1500’s. Catherine de' Medici, the queen consort of France, was the first woman ever documented wearing high heels... particularly because she was short.
Chopines
But before women wore true heels, they were known to wear platform shoes, called "chopines." "It probably originated in Venice and was first worn by prostitutes, but was then adopted by fashionable Venetian aristocrats," Lucy Johnson and Linda Woolley wrote in their book Shoes: A Brief History.
Needing a Crutch
"The style derived from the Turkish bath shoe which kept the feet of the wearer out of the water," Lucy and Linda continued. The nobles who adopted chopines would wear ones measuring up to 20 inches high, and would sometimes require an attendant to help them walk.
Status Symbol
By the 17th century, one-inch heels were super popular among Persian horseback riders, and these men kept them on even while off their horses. And if you owned a horse back then, you likely had money, therefore if you wore heels, you were perceived as wealthy.
Persia-mania
Towards the end of the 17th century, the Persian Shah sent a group of his soldiers to befriend leaders from Russia, Spain, and Germany. This mission led to a surge in high heels among European aristocrats, who adopted the fresh, practical footwear from Persia.
Masculinity and Strength
Said aristocrats viewed heels as symbols of "virility and military prowess," as put by Maude Bass-Krueger for Google Arts & Culture. It's almost bizarre to think there was a time when heeled shoes epitomized masculinity and strength, considering men who wear heels today are often perceived as androgynous, feminine, or even gay.
King Louis XIV
And during the 17th century, it was seen as attractive for men to show off their legs in heels and colored tights and, which, once again, is a style Western women typically flaunt. And of these dudes, King Louis XIV was the poster child for men in heels.
Heels Mandate
When Louis was king, those who donned high, red heels was deemed powerful. In 1670, King Louis XIV even passed a heels mandate, stating that only nobility shall wear heeled shoes. But why red?
Wealth and Power
A red heel symbolized wealth and power, as the wearer was rich enough to have sparkling clean heels, but could also destroy his enemies beneath his feet if need be. Those who wore red heels were to be respected, as well as feared.
Bloody Shoes
Did you notice that the bottom of French designer Christian Louboutin's trademark heel is coated in red? Hmm, we wonder why! But things began to change in the 18th century, as woman's shoes started getting smaller, narrower, more decorative, and higher.
Changes In Style
Men felt as though this change in women's footwear was an attack on the heel's initial masculine intent, therefore men's footwear then became wider and sturdier. Men stopped wearing heels around 1730 due to their new feminine connotation. The transformation was drastic.
The Vanishing of Men's Heels
Once the French Revolution hit in 1789, male aristocrats were officially DONE with high heels. Women loved wearing these new dainty high-heeled shoes, as they made their feet appear smaller and their legs longer. And while the shoes themselves were slim, the heels were chunky until the end of WWII.
Metal Heels
Thanks to wartime technology, fabricators were able to create a slender heel out of metal. A skinny heel made of the typical wood would've snapped with just one step. Postwar heels were able to take on different shapes, and one you know like the back of your hand.
The Stiletto
Though the history of the stiletto heel is somewhat nuanced, designers like Salvatore Ferragamo, André Perugia, and Roger Vivier all contributed to the shoe's success, as seen in its many iterations over the years. Roger Vivier was the one to up the heel's height from approximately two inches to three inches in the 1950s!
Steel Needle
And it wasn't until the '50s that steel was used to create the stiletto heel. "That was when the stiletto was born, when you got those remarkably thin, needle-like high heels," Elizabeth Semmelhack, senior curator of Toronto's Bata Shoe Museum, explained. "Prior to that, it was just a dream."
The Beatle Boot
But of course, as trends come and go, men started wearing heels again during the '60s. During the British Invasion era of music, the Beatles helped popularize the Cuban heel, which was attached to a tight-ankled Chelsea boot.
Ziggy Stardust
And in the 1970s and '80s, we saw androgynous, glam rockers don eyeliner, lipstick, skintight jumpsuits, and, of course, high heels. The late David Bowie, one of the world's most beloved glam rock stars, proudly sported stilettos and platform shoes in a world that was still trapped by rigid gender norms.
Besides setting the bar for glamorous footwear, heels are most famous for hurting generations of women's feet. Who hasn't crammed their toes into an uncomfortable shoe in the name of fashion? Well, as it turned out, one irresponsible shoe habit used to cost many shoppers their lives!
And the X-Ray device used for "proper fit"
Seeing Through Your Shoes
The idea was born with good intentions. Somewhere along the line, somebody thought it would be beneficial to see straight through your shoes to see how well they fit, effectively eliminating questions about how much room there was for your toes.
Chasing Dangerous Ideas
And while the thought of cutting out that part of the process where you wiggle each little piggy and pace back and forth is pretty appealing, there are just some things that shouldn't be simplified. But curiosity got the better of the shoe business on this one.
The Man Who Made It Happen
People point the finger in several directions over who first conceptualized the shoe-fitting fluoroscope, though the most commonly credited with the invention was Dr. Jacob Lowe since his paper trail went back the furthest. He filed a patent for the idea in 1919.
Showing Off The Machine
It was seven more years before the patent was granted, but Dr. Lowe wasted no time shopping his invention around at various medical conventions. The novelty of the machine really grabbed an audience. Who wouldn't want to look at the bones in their feet?
Through The Viewfinder
The machine itself resembled a wooden podium with a little attached step. A prospective shoe store customer would stand on the step, slip their feet into the opening, then look through the viewfinder to see their X-rayed tootsies.
Three Sets Of Eyes
In fact, the shoe-fitting fluoroscope boasted three separate viewfinders, one for the salesman to assess the correct fit, one for the customer, and an extra for the friend or parent who tagged along to the store.
Selling An Attraction
With the shoe-fitting fluoroscope, everyone could achieve that perfect Cinderella glass slipper fit. Right there in the store, you’d get a crystal clear look at how your feet filled out each pair, which made each visit and X-ray an experience bordering on an attraction.
Enamored By The Idea
In those early years, no one batted an eyelash over the potential hazards of X-raying your feet with reckless abandon. It was a technological advancement that was also pretty fun to use. Everyone could see the merits of having these machines in shoe stores.
Industry Standard
Shoe stores all over the United States and eventually Canada, the UK, and Switzerland installed the shoe-fitting fluoroscopes to draw customers to try the cutting edge technology. It quickly became an industry standard.
No License Required
Sometimes called the pedoscope, the X-ray shoe fitter, or just the plain old foot-o-scope, these bad boys were operated hundreds of times each day. You didn't need a special license, it was just the task of any regular sales associate.
Short Sighted Vision
Nobody seemed to think twice about the long term ramifications to all those X-rays, not until decades later. Nope, the focus was more on selling the pseudoscience. Leaving the customer with a memorable experience and a lighter wallet was the top priority.
Appealing With Guilt
By the 1950s there were over 10,000 fluoroscopes in shoe stores across the United States. Part of the marketing technique was to guilt parents, mothers primarily, by insinuating having children with improperly fitted shoes was a moral failing.
Scare Tactics
“With this apparatus," read an excerpt from Dr. Lowe's original patent, "parents can visually assure themselves as to whether they are buying shoes for their boys and girls which will not injure and deform the sensitive bones and joints." Everyone was getting their foot scanned.
Time Caught Up
As years passed, science started catching up to the shoe store death machines. We learned more about the long-term effects of radiation exposure, most glaringly seen in the health problems suffered by the survivors of atomic bombings.
No Regulations
Since shoe-fitting fluoroscopes weren't regulated, each manufacturer made their machines a bit differently. So by default, the amount of radiation seeping out of each one was not the same.
Radiation Leakage
Given the proximity to the X-ray, customers were obviously directly exposed to radiation through their feet. But that's not all. Machines had leakages at a variety of weak points, in the abdomen area, or sometimes, whole body dosages.
At The Most Risk
The ones most affected by the radiation pumping shoe-fitting machines were the ones instructed to sell the gimmick. Sales associates in shoe stores operated the fluoroscopes hundreds of times a day, unknowingly poisoning themselves over and over.
Finally Banned
It took until the 1970s for shoe-fitting fluoroscopes to get universally banned, though they'd already trickled out of fashion. This was bolstered by documented amputations brought on by complications from radiation exposure, as well as numerous related cases of foot cancer.
Glazed Over History
There wasn't much of a reaction to the fact that people used unregulated radiation machines in shoe stores for decades without a care in the world. It became another forgotten chapter of history that makes you shake your head in disbelief.
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