Well heeled – the history of the stiletto
Getting ready for a night out, many women need a final touch to feel done, before they feel ready to go out (usually sans coat and sensible shoes.) A swipe of lipstick, a smudge of perfume, a slick of eyeliner. For me, it’s a heel. And no, platforms and god forbid, wedges, just don’t cut it. Adele Baxby reports on the history of the stiletto.
Slipping your feet into a stiletto heel you feel instantly elegant, powerful and sexy. And women for hundreds of years have been donning stilettos to feel this way.
To be classed as a stiletto a shoe must have a heel with a diameter measuring less than half a centimetre and a height of between one and eight inches. Named after the stiletto dagger, the shoe can be traced back to 4000BC, when ancient Egyptians painted depictions of the shoe on the walls of tombs.
Stilettos have always been associated with power and luxury. The term ‘well heeled’ came about in the 16th century, to suggest wealthy and therefore able to afford fabulous shoes.
The aristocracy of the 16th century believed the higher the heel, the higher the social status and some women would wear heels up to 24 inches high and have to be helped into them by servants.
Marie Antoinette, a queen famed for her extravagance and excess wanted to look her best on her execution day in 1793 so donned a two inch pair of stilettos.
Sex and stilettos have always gone hand in hand. Any femme fatale is incomplete without a pair of killer heels, and fetish drawings show women them as far back as the 1880s. And Marilyn wouldn’t have been quite so alluring in a pair of pumps.
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Category: 1950s, Accessories, Fashion, Vintage news
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