How Much Are Those Manolos in the Window?
I’m sitting in the coffee shop at the Borders in Rosemont with Lauren Hart, 39, a singer, and the co-host of NBC’s 10!, which airs on weekday mornings. Lauren’s a definite Shoewoman, and shows me her one-toed Nikes, a line originally developed for a famous Kenyan marathoner. Even I notice that they have “personality,” the quality she was looking for.
“Good shoes fit your personality,” she tells me. “I have a quirkier style, eccentric.” On the show, they let her wear whatever she chooses, and she is even given shoes to wear for endorsements, which she likes. She looks around the coffee shop for examples of “good shoes,” and instead finds the opposite.
“There are some bad shoes here,” she says. Because she’s a sweet person, she doesn’t want to say more, but I’m not that sweet, and I press her. Where? I wanna see bad shoes. I wanna see someone who screwed up.
Finally, and it isn’t easy, she breaks down, and subtly points out a woman dressed in black business attire. I was expecting to see feet covered with flashing clown slippers, but instead I see a woman with nice legs. That’s all my brain records. Oh, and some black shoes. Pumps, I think.
Maybe I’m not ready for Vogue just yet.
“They … they just don’t fit,” Lauren whispers, and I understand. I understand that Lauren sees some discordance there, and the fact that I don’t notice anything is the point. There should be something to notice. “But you have good shoes,” she says.
I do? Yes! I look down at my dusty brown boots. Finally! A compliment for my footwear. Thank you, impoverished Honduran schoolchild! Maybe she was just being nice, but I think her point was that fashion is just being yourself.
So why do women buy a lot of shoes? Be-
cause it’s fun for them. Because it’s a form of expression, which apparently takes a long time to understand, and it’s a subtle, behind-the-scenes language, with each one of them speaking it a little differently. It’s a harmless diversion, and it’s retail therapy.
I find myself thinking about the Italian loafers. Two hundred seventy-five bucks really isn’t that much. And if I bought two pairs, they’d last three times as long.