Are high heels becoming obsolete?

[SlipperOrchid]

I rarely wear anything except flats anymore. It wasn't intentional, simply practical footwear for chasing young children around.

However, more often than not, if I was going out for the evening, I wore mid heels as I felt more 'dressed up' in them. My heels were neither comfortable nor uncomfortable although if I had to choose, I will say the latter as when I got home I kicked them off

My social life has changed from late nigh bars to restaurants and putting on heels to go and sit down with my feet under a table seems bordering on insanity.

Trainers are now more popular than ever. I have over ten pairs and wear them daily apart wearing flat boots when it rains (like today!).

I follow En Brogue and she never wears heels and although I know this started for medical reasons, her choice of flat shoes makes perfect sense for everyone.

At the weekend, I had a great seat by an upstairs window in a coffee shop in a capital city where I spent over an hour people watching. Everyone was wearing flat shoes or trainers. I saw one woman who clumped around rather ungracefully in heeled boots and she stood out quite a lot.

Afterwards | went shoe shopping (for a pair of loafers in Aldo) and noticed for the first time that the section for 'high heels' was tiny.
Am I simply totally unstylish these days? Do many of you still wear heels? Or have heels had their day?

I should add that I under 5ft 3" and always liked feeling taller in heels :).

My daughters are in their teens and wouldn’t be seen dead in heels, unless dressing up. They go out in tiny skirts and dresses but always with trainers on their feet!

Men love women in heels. It’s the sex thing
Obviously someone will come on saying their h doesn’t but he’s probably sitting in a dark room with the Legendary mn “ man hobby “

Men love women in heels

So?

Sex?

Maybe 80s porn (not seen any tbh)

I don't think there is much footwear featuring in modern porn

But yes, in the 80s sexiness was all about high heels, red lipstick and big hair

But are heels really always about sex now? And about being sexually available? (And mainly worn by porn stars? ) Will someone tell Lorraine in accounts?!

I’m loving the image of all these husbands furiously abusing themselves to a nice picture of a red high heel. 😂

@florisme I hear you! I still have some old school corporate south African clients... bloody dream packing to work with them... trouser suit, heeled boot, different shirt each day of week, small earrings job done. My trendy smart casual table tennis in the office playing dutch clients however.... absolute minefield and much harder to pack.

I hope so! I hate them and have quite a dressy style, can’t stand heels though. They hurt no matter how expensive. I refuse to do it to fit in.

Notinmyduty I've just read your thread and all I can say is holy fuck you poor thing. I think Xing' suggestion is clever.

This is why, despite wearing mostly flats for 40 odd years, I view the change as fashion rather than anything progressive. Because only certain types of flat are acceptable in this new regime and people are still tying themselves up in knots trying to fit in.

It's not liberation when you exchange one set of rules for another, especially when the new rules are twice as long and written in Latin.

Men love women in heels. It’s the sex thing

Why then we of course we should all wear them...........,,,,,,,,,

I despair.

Men love women in heels. Then they can fuck off back to the 50s and stay there. When men start wearing uncomfortable clothing because women love it, they might have some say in the matter.

Men love women in heels. It’s the sex thing

Maybe some of us see ourselves as more than a sex object for men to get off over?

Plus if you really want to go down that train of thought, then you should know around 10years a go there was a study that looked into men's arousal and heels. That study concluded that whilst a high proportion of men were more aroused by women standing around in heels than flats, the majority preferred women walking in flats - this was put down to the fact that there are very few women who can walk naturally in heels.

I think any one wandering round on a Saturday during the day in heels looks silly. And many people work In more casual environments now.

But in my line of business for important meetings I would wear heels (not super high) in boots, ankle boots, kitten or T bars. To look smart. And on an evening out I might wear some heeled ankle boots or wedge sandals. As well as wearing converse I often wear low heeled ankle boots casually with an inch or inch and a half heels - I have high arches and need to support them or my feet hurt.

I don't think they will die out entirely - I'd be surprised to go to a wedding and see everyone in flats. And for smart more formal professions I think they will still be popular.

Floisme this board is a about style so of course these things are discussed here. In real life women are not going to go back to wearing high heels in large numbers because it elongates their legs. Comfort is the most important thing now ahead of looks. That's why leggings are never going to go away.

I’m not sure which post of mine you’re referring to feeling? None of the comments about heels lengthening legs are mine. The reason I think heels will eventually come back is that fashion is cyclical (and because, as I’ve said already, I think this change is led by fashion, not liberation) and because even if this generation remembers the discomfort, their daughters will not.

I’m not sure that comfort is the most important thing ahead of looks for a lot of women feeling The really high rise super skinny jeans that cut you in half when you sit down is a good example. Many women prefer comfort, many prefer looks, many try and find a compromise. Not everyone is the same and that’s why heels will never go away in my view. Often it’s the young that wear the extreme fashions that don’t have any comfort but not always. Trainers are v fashionable with the young but so are heels as many posters have said. Lots of women getting older will go for comfort as pp have said here but again, not all.

Sorry Flo , your post on Thurs 16.11.03. Should have quoted.
Of course the fashion for high heels might come back, that doesn't mean that the general public will adopt it if they don't want to.
I do think it's connected to feminism personally, fewer women feel the need to be uncomfortable (and risk potential health problems) in order to look a certain way.
I put high heel shoes in the same category as girdles and underwired pushup bras - things that women wore/wear for looks rather than comfort. Girdles seem to have died a death now, I'm not sure about the old wonderbras but there are plenty of other options in the shops such as crop tops so I would guess they're quite popular.
I also think we're going to have walking pushed on us more as a way of tackling the obesity crisis and high heels aren't really compatible with that.

I dont really understand how so many people are saying heels aren’t fashionable anymore. Yes there’s loads of choice now but the shops are still full to bursting with high heels. Someone’s buying them

No prob, feeling you mean this post? (Apols for quoting myself!)
I don’t think it’s much to do with feminism. I don’t wear them and I won’t if they come back into fashion but if other women like them that’s up to them, although clearly if they’re expected to wear them for work then that’s another matter. I think the pressures on women to remove body hair, cover up greys and never look old or angry are far worse - and there’s no sign of them going away.

Yeah I still agree with what I wrote then. Obviously you don't have to

I'd been thinking about girdles myself. (My mum wore them and so did my older sister for a while.) I agree they've gone but in their place we have Spanx, extreme diets and punishing gym regimes. In other words, women are still trying to modify their bodies and faces, not for fun (which I entirely approve of) but to meet some unachievable standard, see also Botox, hair dye, waxing etc.

I do think it's connected to feminism personally, fewer women feel the need to be uncomfortable (and risk potential health problems) in order to look a certain way.

The pressure for women to look a certain way is more extreme than ever imo. BOTOX and fillers are no longer extreme cosmetic surgeries but run of the mill procedures that many women have. Advertisers luke dove try to tell us to embrace our natural beauty... only as long as it has flawless skin and is visually appealing.

If the rejection of heels is really a feminist issue then feminism really needs to buck up it's ideas... I'd rather be pressured to wear heels that i can remove at the end of the day than feel pressure to entirely alter my appearance.

Ah floisme got to it before me.

Tootrousers well I'm from the generation that used to lay on the bed and pull their jeans zip up with a coathanger, so I understand the jeans thing. I do think you grow out of that kind of thing quite quickly though.