One of the most important things to consider when designing the collection was heel heights. Massive generalization but the majority of people with larger feet are tall, however there a few exceptions, Kate Winslet has size 9 feet and is only 5'6', so we really needed to consider heel heights to suit everyone.
There were some questions I posed to myself... I'm 5'10". Do I wear heels "YES", do I wear them all the time "NO", when I wear them how do I feel "Empowered", do I like being taller that my friends "Yes", sometimes. Love it at work and when I'm out on the town, but not so much if I'm down the pub in a more relaxed environment". My pet hate.. towering over men, it makes me feel really unfeminine even if I'm in the sexiest of heels, men you need to grow!
Is it socially acceptable to tower over your man these days, do you get funny looks in the street? You don't see it very often but I'm always the first one to comment. Is it the men or women or just me that has an Issue ? Do men feel less masculine? Not Tom Cruise, he loves taller ladies all three of his wives have been taller and it hasn't stopped them from wearing heels. Especially Nicole Kidman who was the tallest of the three and she has a size 9 foot.
That extra half an inch really does matter though, I have two pairs of shoes at home that haven't even made it out of the box. Another annoying fact with regards to finding shoes for larger feet, when you do manage to find a pair that's suitable the majority of the time the heel's are so high you're barley balancing on the balls of your feet, swaying or even worse slouching because you're so self conscious of the fact you're too tall.
We needed to lock down on the heel height, high enough to make an impact but low enough to be able to wear all day, its a fine line between sexy and frumpy. Wouldn't it be great if you could have a retractable heel that differs in height, day to evening 'eat your heart out'.
After many skype calls with Katy in China with her trying on the samples and showing me on the web cam, thank goodness for modern technology, we decided that the collection should have three heel heights. Small, medium and tall after all we didn't want to alienate anyone. What I didn't know and what you probably don't know, is the heel is at its true height at a size 7, as you scale up and down the heel gets smaller and taller respectively to help the shoe balance. With this in mind we decided that our ready to wear collection would mainly sit around the mid heel offering or approx 3" with some smaller and taller heels also included. However, being a bespoke shoe company they can produce these shoes in any three of the heel heights required and if you so wish to change the colour you can, for an extra fee, sky's the limit.
This is my journey to help find the perfect shoe, Cinderella shall go to the ball.