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.

*Well, my floor is antique and very hardwearing"... "Oh, well, I have 85 pairs of shoes, each in its own climate-controlled box." Grow up!! No one cares!

Lots of people care and are clearly sufficiently grown up not to worry about their silly carpets.

I guess it's all about semantics.

If I invite friends round for dinner, then I guess, yes it's a dinner party. I would not wish them to wear cocktail dresses and find the thought odd.

I also though wouldn't say they were "coming round for their tea" I find that a bit odd as well, that makes it sound like a fairly mundane sharing your cottage pie dinner in front of the telly before fucking off home type of thing.

So I think calling it coming round for your tea to be downplaying it, and stating a dinner party has to have a dress code such as cocktail dresses over playing it. For me, it's just having friends round for dinner.

For me, when I am hosing, I serve dinner, I wouldn't say I am having a dinner party, as that's such a old fashioned term, but in essence one that is accurate.

I think there are widely accepted hygiene rules that mainly relate to food preparation and avoiding infection through handwashing - for example after visiting the loo. There's also a kind of social etiquette about washing in order not to offend people through body odour. Beyond that there are specific social rules about visiting hospital wards or what to do around people who may experience anaphylactic shocik. I am absolutely fine with all these things.

But, for example, I regularly go to the well-run and highly rated care home where a great many frail elderly people - including my father in law who is 97 and has emphysema - live - and am just welcomed in, without asking to remove shoes or take any other precautions, part of me does feel that some Mumsnetters are unduly fearful.

Naturally if I were to become friendly with you and visit your home I'd do my best to be a good guest. But my private views would still be to wish you weren't so anxious. For your sake, as much as mine.

Lots of people care

What? About your 17th century floor? Doubt it

Oh Anxious, do grow up. Those of us who wear shoes in the house were asked where we keep them. I was clear about where mine were kept. Obviously I care more about my shoes than my carpets so I keep mine in their boxes so they don't get dirty - a bit like your floors, I guess.

Shoes off all the way!

Funny that you're telling me to "grow up" shortly after I said the same to you. Get your own admonishment!

Yes, someone asked where you kept your shoes. They didn't ask how many you had, did they?

I don't even have carpets, so I don't know why you're comparing your lovingly boxed shoes to my carpets

I've tried to make it clear that (dog poo issues aside) my main problem with this thread is the nasty snobbery. You stealth-boasting about your excessive shoe collection is an excellent case in point.

*correction, my floors not carpets. Yes, I do have floors. But I don't insist guests remove shoes. I can just see it's more hygienic if they do...

You think my shoe collection is excessive? It's very modest compared to one of my friend's.

not the sort of occasion where anyone would be worrying about planning the correct shoes to make their legs look nice)
Ah Maisy, i refuse to believe that you and your guests give not a single thought to how you look when you go to each other’s homes for dinner/tea. You don’t look for a top that goes with those jeans, or brush your hair or stick some earrings in? If you do, why does choosing shoes that complement your outfit seem so much work?

my main problem with this thread is the nasty snobbery. You stealth-boasting about your excessive shoe collection is an excellent case in point.

I think you've just decided that the shoes off people are snobs and now you see everything through that lens.

Bluelady making a factual statement about how many shoes she owns is not snobbery. Neither is raising the possibility of people coming round to your house for a party.

Ah Maisy, i refuse to believe that you and your guests give not a single thought to how you look when you go to each other’s homes for dinner/tea. You don’t look for a top that goes with those jeans, or brush your hair or stick some earrings in? If you do, why does choosing shoes that complement your outfit seem so much work?

If you live in a shoes off place - then you don’t give it a second thought about going shoeless in someone’s house. You still might factor in the overall look for getting there or when out in shops, restaurants etc when you do wear shoes.

Well, someone making a factual statement about, say, how much their house is worth wouldn't be snobbery as such, no. But if no one had asked and you announced that your house was worth a million pounds (or another figure that you knew was much in excess of average) - well, I'd have a fairly unfavourable opinion of you.

Of course there's snobbery on this thread!! (And not just from RoseWhite, which would hardly be worthy of remark). The very fact that a thread about the practicalities of shoes inside has deteriorated into a competition about who is the best host and who has the most shoes is speaks for itself!!

Many (not all - Stupomax has been v pleasant) shoe- on advocates have been at great pains to show us how sophisticated, good at entertaining etc they are. Pretending that 80 pairs of shoes is about average is nasty bullshit, considering some posters will havs about five pairs max.

Posturing about your lifestyle is as low as it gets.

Look. Shoes are my passion. Truly, I love them. My collection has been amassed over more than 30 years. It's not average but it's not wealth boasting either. I genuinely struggle to understand anyone having five pairs.

You "struggle to understand" someone having five pairs??

Do you "struggle to understand" people using food banks too?

Ye gods.

We were kind of asked by being asked where we keep our shoes if not at the door - I keep a pair at the door (to put on after work heels come off) but couldn’t keep all my shoes there even if I wanted to. If your feet stay the same size you can keep amassing shoes for decades - plus you can buy loads for around a tenner depending what you like.

No I don't struggle to understand people using food banks. I'm bloody angry that they need to exist at all. Social injustice generally makes me furious but let's face it the number of shoes I own isn't going to make a happorth of difference to it. I think you're just going out of your way to be outraged now, Anxious.

Anyway, I've had enough of this.

Maybe it was entirely necessary to say you have 80 pairs of shoes, rather than just "too many to keep by the front door." Guess we'll never know.

I find showing off about perceived "class" and wealth absolutely revolting. And I feel that many posters did that. There was a hell of a lot of sneering - at "lower middle class" habits, at lack of dinner parties, at slippers(!)

I don't personally feel judged. I won't discuss my own circumstances- but I am not speaking out of envy.

Looking down on people due to "class", upbringing, wealth etc is just vile.

Our lounge carpet is off white and we want to keep it that way, so yes, we politely ask guests to remove shoes before they come into the lounge. Most don't mind. I might not ask if we had wooden floors though.

Ah Maisy, i refuse to believe that you and your guests give not a single thought to how you look when you go to each other’s homes for dinner/tea. You don’t look for a top that goes with those jeans, or brush your hair or stick some earrings in? If you do, why does choosing shoes that complement your outfit seem so much work?
I haven't said we go looking like a scruff.
There's a difference between getting dressed and looking put together and getting dressed up.

The way some have carried on on here about woman getting all dolled up and pick shoes to make their legs look nice or to make them feel thin and that going barefoot is going to make them feel rubbish about themselves.

Surely most average families of 4 or 5 have too many shoes to keep by the door.

We're a shoes off house, but we all keep our shoes in our own rooms.

Piles and piles and shoes in the entrance way isn't a great look (I'm sure I'll now get harangued for not approving of this) - simply because between the four of us, we have too many shoes to store them all there. I wouldn't even want to keep a few pairs there - it looks cluttered and untidy.

Keeping shoes in bedrooms or hallway cupboards, or, I don't know, laundries (anywhere out of the way) is surely not that unusual that there are actually shoes-off people wondering where people put them. Use your imagination.

Surely the rule HAS to be that boots - walking boots. wellies, jodhpur boots, rugby boots are kept in the downstairs cupboard in the porch and all other shoes are tidily disposed in shoe racks

Anyone who doesn't do this has failed my shoe test and I reserve the right to feel superior to them for the rest of my life.

For many of us "looking put together" includes our shoes. They aren't some magical fancy items, just part of our outfit.

AnxiousPeg

Lots of people care

What? About your 17th century floor?

You don’t it interesting that a house has such a history? Fine. Many people do, for goodness sake.

The floors have not lasted for all that time, however. We merely have a later version but they are wood.

Anxious - okaaay so we have ascertained that your floors are laminate.