It’s happened. The day I hoped would never come. The day I can no longer wear high heels. To those who have never loved high heels, this may seem like utter trivia. But those who, like me, have worn them since the age of 15 will understand my misery.
High heels are not simply a style of shoe. They are a whole identity. Whenever somebody saw my heels and said: ‘I don’t know how you wear them, I find them so uncomfortable’ – as they often did – I’d look back in pity.
But now it’s payback time. It’s not as if it happened in one bombshell moment, of course, but until last week I was in denial. Each time I slipped my feet into one of my countless pairs of heels and had to acknowledge an unmistakable discomfort, I blamed it on that particular pair. It was the gradient of my black and red satin Prada evening shoes, I’d tell myself. Tottering off a pair of towering Christian Louboutins at a party couldn’t have had anything to do with my balance, I’d decide.
But last week I had to admit defeat as I put on a treasured pair of high-heeled Manolo Blahniks. I knew the evening would require standing for several hours, and although those lovely shoes added not only height but a certain glamour to my outfit, I had to get real. It was going to be agony. There was nothing for it but to scale down.
Anybody who wears high heels knows it isn’t just the fact they make you look taller. They give you a kind of confidence, a winner-takes-all feeling.
The right pair alters your posture, getting rid of the schlump you get from trainers. They make your ankles appear more refined.
When I was at Vogue, Manolo Blahnik ran me up the perfect shoes with a 9 cm heel. Not the common 7.5 cm – which I can still wear easily but consider a bit squat – nor his 10 cm, which was always too high for comfort.
I still have five pairs of them in my wardrobe and they are not going anywhere. They are heirlooms.
And if it’s really the case that I can no longer wear them, I am keeping them as treasures to hand down – along with the memories – to the next generation.
High heels are not simply a style of shoe. They are a whole identity, writes Alexandra Shulman
A pair of red elegant shoes on a white background (stock photo)
The power of three can be a real joy
When my stepdaughter was young, we took several holidays with her and two friends. It was generally a nightmare. Two of the three always ganged up on the third in ever-changing loyalties, resulting in misery for whoever was excluded.
The potential toxicity of the three-women friendship triangle has been brilliantly exposed in the latest series of The White Lotus, where three blonde forty-somethings betray and bitch about each other as soon as one of them leaves the sun lounger.
But I am here to say it doesn’t need to be like that. Last weekend I took a short break to Amsterdam with two female friends in almost perfect harmony. OK, there was a soupcon of friction over where we were going to eat, but that was all.
It’s the third trip we’ve taken, and I’ve concluded this triumvirate works because we don’t know each other too well. We have no decades-old memories of past bad behaviour to hark back to. No irritating patterns of betrayal to call to mind. We’re new enough acquaintances to make an effort with each other, which is not always the case with girlfriends you’ve had for years.
That said, unlike The White Lotus trio, we weren’t hanging out with crazy lithe Russian men. Who knows what would happen if we did. Perhaps next time.
Dicing with death in the Dutch capital
If there was ever a good reason to discourage London from becoming a cycling city it’s Amsterdam. The hordes of cyclists streaming along the streets are terrifying. We lost count of the number of times one of us was nearly knocked over.
Unlike the Lycra and helmet-clad fiends in London, Amsterdam cyclists are disguised as normal people. Few wear helmets and they paddle along in perfectly regular clothes. But that doesn’t mean that they make any effort to co- exist with pedestrians.
Anyone on foot is corralled on to narrow pavements as the cyclists whizz by with the sense of entitlement you so often find in those who think their aggressive behaviour is justified because they’re saving the planet.
A new brush with the hair salon police
‘Nigella Lawson reveals she doesn’t brush her hair. Neither do I’, writes Alexandra Schulman
So, Nigella Lawson reveals she doesn’t brush her hair. Neither do I. But I do wash mine at reasonable intervals – or so I thought until a visit to the hairdresser’s the other day for a blow dry.
‘One or two shampoos?’ the young girl asked.
To which I answered one, ever eager to get out of a hair salon speedily.
She looked at my hair dismissively and asked when it was last washed. I replied that fortunately it was only the other day. That was not good enough for my inquisitor who wanted to know exactly when. Well three days, if you must know.
Three days was clearly considered tantamount to filthy, and two washes it had to be. At least I was able to escape the head massage.
A uni protest that ended in disaster
My alma mater Sussex University is in the news for breaching regulations on free speech after Professor Kathleen Stock was hounded out for her views in the transgender debate.
Sussex has always had form in the politically correct – or incorrect – arena. During my time there in the late 1970s, we were always having sit-ins over some issue or other.
One module in my Social Anthropology course focused on the independence of Kenya and Tanganyika.
The University of Sussex have been fined £585,000 for failing to uphold free speech. Pictured Protestors gathered in Library Square at Sussex University to rally against Professor Kathleen Stock
I can’t remember a thing about it other than resenting the fact our reading lists and seminars gave a purely Marxist interpretation of events.
Not entirely wisely, I confronted my tutor on this – and not entirely surprisingly, I failed the module.
