To ask all guests to take shoes off in my house?

[chardonm]

Just that really. A few people seem really put off by that.

My dear sil has to be reminded several times before she takes them off.

I hate the thought of trailing the dirt inside the house.

InertPotato

I am tickled by those of the "shoes on" brigade who keep citing grand dinner parties as some sort of clincher! They're desperate for us to understand that they live in a Downton Abbey type set up

That's such a weird assumption. I don't often (ever?) wear cocktail attire to my friend's houses, but I do often wear heels with jeans/trousers/a skirt/whatever to their houses for a dinner party. Surely this is not some upper-class affectation?

The odd shoes off people cannot host dinner parties - for reasons of carpet guarding - and therefore do not have a clue about how one ought to behave. Poor souls.

AnxiousPegg

But, as I say, my life isn't punctuated by a round of formal social events...

Figures. 🙄

But surely it's not beyond the realms of understanding that other people do.

Yes. But then we get stuff like "shoe-off people cannot host dinner parties for fear of getting the carpet dirty" ingnorant comments. Some people don't host dinner parties regardless. It's not for everyone. I hate cooking for one, it seems super formal for second, and I don't have the space.

Oooh RoseWhite so withering and clever. Do you read a lot of Oscar Wilde?

If your shoe/floor policy is dictated by formal social occasions, well, firstly I don't actually believe you, but secondly, you lead a very different life from most people I know.

Everyone I know is too bloody busy.

It's surely not beyond anyone's imagination to conceive that even strict shoe-offers (of which I am not one) might relax the policy if they were throwing a formal event?

Oooh RoseWhite so withering and clever. Do you read a lot of Oscar Wilde?

I like FeistyPeg!

I've been thinking about why I dislike being asked to remove (non-muddy) shoes in other people's houses.

Whenever it's happened it has been people I don't know enormously well - not close friends.

Though I stick to dress codes at work and formal occasions - a black tie sort of party - I don't associate dress codes with less formal socialising. So being told what to wear/not to wear feels a bit off. More like being at school. 'These are the rules. I want you to keep to them' There's an imbalance of power, though of course social politeness dictates that you comply.

There's also something very specific about being asked to remove clothing and I regard shoes as clothing. Your hosts are asking you to make yourself vulnerable and do something that may not feel natural or comfortable. (Would you ask a Muslim guest to remove her veil/hijab because you feel more comfortable if she hasn't got one on. The Boris Johnsons of this world would but it doesn't do a lot for increased cultural dialogue.)

There is also something that really goes way back for me and is to do with childhood abuse. Being trapped in a room and being hit. I think deep down there's always a sense of preferring to be able to get out quickly if it proves necessary. By asking me to remove my shoes, you are making it less easy for me to leave a situation because you may have put them away somewhere. I'm going to have to ask for my shoes back and it will take me a while to get them on. It gives you power over me and that makes me feel quite distressed and uneasy.

So if you really are my friend you'll let me wipe my feet very carefully and then keep my shoes on in your house.

That's very interesting JennieLee. Me too. I also panic when people ask to take my coat and I don't know where it's gone. It sounds so childish admitting that, but I really do.

We used to change into slippers even at school. It's so deeply embeded, I just can't help it ad personally feel bad for bringing all the pee, spit, dust, poo and millions of other things in, when I visit someone. I think the habits from when you were growing up and had it hammered in are really quite hard to break. Where I grew up it's considered really rude to walk around inside in shoes.
Many cultures have this as well.

*inside houses just in case

But, as I say, my life isn't punctuated by a round of formal social events..

it seems super formal for second, and I don't have the space.

If your shoe/floor policy is dictated by formal social occasions,

'Formal', 'formal', 'formal'....!!

What's with the bizarre assumption that people who have friends over for dinner regularly, host 'formal' functions.

It's a dinner party. It's friends. It's usually more raucous than formal. And no, they absolutely do not have to take their shoes off when they arrive!

Hosting a "dinner party" just sounds formal, even if it's not very formal.

Thank you OftenHangry for replying!

@Strugglingtodomybest you are welcome. I also put them through washing machine from time to time. But if the spray is good for shoes used by 10s of people a day in a bowling alley, it's good for my ikea slippers 😁

Is it? It's weird to me that people are banging on about the integrity of their outfits at all these dinner parties as if that is what their life revolves around

I think it means they don't have shoe-off houses and these are their thoughts about them when asked.

What's with the bizarre assumption that people who have friends over for dinner regularly, host 'formal' functions.
It's a dinner party
... where people get dressed up in carefully chosen outfits that would be ruined if they didnt get to keep their shoes on.
Even saying hosting a dinner party sounds formal.

No worries people, there's clearly enough of us who have friends round for some food where one doesn't carefully consider one's attire for the evening.

It's amusing that some can't see how hosting dinner parties where you get dressed up is totally middle class and toward the more formal type of gathering (I would imagine the type where guests would bring a nice bottle of plonk but the host would insist that they didn't because it would be ghastly to request or discuss guests bringing anything in advance, but equally they'd start an AIBU thread if a guest didn't turn up with wine and chocolates).

I reallY don’t get the angst. Some people prefer shoes off, some people prefer shoes on. I have a physical disability and walking without shoes or my proper soled slippers is painful. However, I’ll put up with it for the first visit and then remember for my future visits. My automatic question is to ask what the host would prefer. That said, there’s no way I’m wearing manky communal slippers or socks, blergh.

Why does everyone thinks shared and desinefcted slippers are "manky"?
Like yeah, they can be, but most of us do take good care of them. Have none of you ever went bowling? Or tried a shoe on in a store? What do you do with shoes when you bring them from the shop? There was provabably 20 feet in them before? Obviously it's personal preference. Some people are ok with shoes in house, but some don't for various reasons like keeping dust down or bacteria when someone has weaker immune system or allergies. Or it's just embeded habit.

All people whatever their social status have internalised rules which involve wearing particular clothes and enacting ritualised behaviours. If 'outsiders' come along and don't understand the rules or ignore them or challenge them, then the dominant group feels uncomfortable. They'll have to get the outsiders to conform and/or do something to reassert their power.

There are just as many 'rules' about how to behave at football-related drinking session or a hen do on the Costa Brava.

If your shoe/floor policy is dictated by formal social occasions

It's not. It's dictated by what I grew up with and the norms of my social circle (just like everyone else's).

I'm just interested in what shoes off people do. I don't think it's unusual to invite friends round for the kind of occasion where you would dress up in a nice outfit (though clearly on this thread it makes you a freak of nature ).

I won't buy shoes that have been tried on. I make them get me a box fresh pair so I'm definitely not wearing someone's nasty communal slippers.

Yes, shoes off at the door otherwise you're walking all the muck from the bottom of your shoes across your floors.
And then walking in that during the times that surely everyone is barefoot, such as going to the shower.
Barefoot or socks I don't care but not with shoes on. I can see what's all over the pavements and in public loos etc that goes on the underside of your shoe and I just don't want to be stepping in that at home.

I love that this thread is almost 700 replies long!

I turned down an invitation to a party at someone's house this summer, mainly because in every single communication about it she added 'and remember, no shoes in the house!' Every email, can conversation and text, no bloody shoes was mentioned.

I mean, way to make people feel welcome. It made me think her party would be shit.

I have been bowling (though not recently). I didn't enjoy wearing the manky bowling shoes. I don't think anyone does.

Not unreasonable at all as long as you provide slippers.

Inert potato

But if their first thoughts are how shoes on/off relates to the type of occasion where shoe are vital to an outfit, isn't that weird? I mean, sure, we all might have the odd dinner party where people dress up. But (for me and I suspect many others) that's a fairly infrequent occurrence. I wouldn't formulate my ideas about footwear in general based on that specific portion of time where normal rules might be suspended; I'd focus on the, say, 90% of times that people are in your house in ordinary, non-dinner party attire! The way some posters were going on, you'd think every time they opened the door, Lord and Lady Fotherington-Smyth were standing there in evening dress waiting to be wined and dined.

I have full sympathy for the thoughtful reasons people have given for not wanting to take shoes off.

And, morbid fear of dog poo aside, I don't have strong enough feelings about this to actually ask my guests to de-shoe.

I just can't bear snobbery. All the posters banging on about class markers and so on are just intolerable. Some posters are clearly trying to paint a picture of their social circle all standing around in cocktail dresses and sneering at people's attempts to keep their hard-earned carpets clean. Yes, laugh at their slippers. You sound awful.