Why do we like/want to wear heels?

[Shyheels]

My New Years' resolution to explore heels - specifically stilettos - has prompted a bit of (unworried, untroubled) introspection. Why do I want to adopt a pair of stilettos? Curiosity is a big factor - as I said in another post, I would bet that  the overwhelming majority of men would love to try on a pair of heels just to see what it was like, how it felt, how it looked.

But such is society and it’s hidebound perceptions of masculinity that even the acknowledgement of such curiosity is buried good and deep within us.

For many if not most guys, I would imagine, even an inkling that such a curiosity existed within them, beneath the surface, would be deeply unsettling, and prompt the hostile fearful reactions one sees. On a similar note I suspect too some of those reactions are based on envy, seeing someone else dare to do something they might wish to try too but daren’t. Seeing someone assume a freedom, take a liberty, is also unsettling and prompts angry responses. It’s how motorists view cyclists - people who are escaping the enslavement if the automobile and all its attendant costs, red tape, fines and legalities.

I know that in my case, having given myself permission for some time now to wear otk suede boots (flats) it is only natural to acknowledge the curiosity that is within and act upon it. I am sure there are plenty of other factors, but a simple healthy curiosity must be the biggest motivating force.

 

 

 

 

Edited January 8, 2018 by Shyheels

[Puffer]

Well said, Shyheels.   In my case, heel-wearing was prompted by two stimuli: (a) an admiration of footwear (on women) coupled with more than a tinge of envy that they could wear something more glamorous and elegant that men were 'allowed' - and heels in particular; (b) a wish to experiment, much as you suggest, for essentially physical and curiosity reasons.   But you will be aware from other posts how I have been pilloried (by Mrs P) on both counts, just for having those thoughts, let alone indulging.

I am however honest enough to recognise that there is another underlying 'encouragement'.   The wearing (actual or imagined) of an article of female clothing with a sexy image is likely to be arousing.   I'm not sure I understand exactly the parameters but indulging in something which is different/naughty and recognising that most men have a degree of latent femininity trying to escape are key aspects.   Whether, and to what extent, it brings on more sensual feelings (and potentially fulfilment) is something that only experimentation can determine.   And whether wearing women's footwear is but a stepping-stone [pun alert] to more complete cross-dressing or some form of 'transition' must be again a very individual and personal matter that is likely to take time to emerge.   In my case, no such desire exists (beyond, perhaps, 'dressing-up' for fun on some suitable occasion, such as the Rocky Horror Show - not that I ever have.)

The psychologists would have a field day, I'm sure!   And I must be careful as I have one living next door - with a psychiatrist for a husband!

[Shyheels]

I share both of the external stimuli you mention. I have long thought tall boots looked nice and begrudged/envied women the freedom they enjoyed to have such theatricality in their wardrobe. High heeled boots had the added tantalising appeal of being that bit further out of reach and therefore even more intriguing. When one adds the natural curiosity factor which I am sure is very widespread among men - who wouldn't be at least a bit curious about what it was like to wear heels - the only question then is do you indulge your sense of curiosity or do you bury it, pretend it isn't there, doesn't exist. 

Even more challenging is the question of what happens if you do dare to try out heels - do you open yourself to the possibility that you might like it, or do you go into it with a scoffing dismissive attitude like so many of the male journalists who write articles about their day in heels? And if you do dare to open yourself to the possibility that it might be something you like, what happens then if in fact you find you actually do like heels - love wearing them in fact. Do you admit it to yourself? Do you do it again? Make your experimental hour in heels become your experimental day in heels or your week in heels? Or do you just try to forget the whole thing? Live it down?

[FastFreddy2]

While I may have hidden my feelings (if I had them) in my earlier years, I have never hidden my feelings from myself. Rather, I've tended try and turn any idea I had, (no matter how fantastic they might seem) into a reality. Past the age of say "late thirties", and having had a brush with psychology through college studies (business management) I've pretty much been an open book wherever possible. I'm sure being honest with yourself - perhaps working through difficult feelings or thoughts, is the key to avoiding the potential for confusion and anger. 

 

I knew at a very young age, I liked the look of a heel (on someone else) and enjoyed the feeling of wearing a heel too. Back then I would have seen high heel wearers as glamorous made-up ladies. I tried on my mothers heeled mules, and loved them. I would have been under 8 years at that time.

There is a notion that we have pretty much made up our personalities by the time we are 6. I've always been a late starter, so for me it would have had to be later than that - possibly. One thing is for sure, I don't remember much of my life not being interested in the look of a women, how they presented themselves, what they wore. Most of that would have come from films and television, we lived in a quiet rural town, and I was young. Women folk, for the most part mothers looking after their children, would have appeared drab to me. Those at the cinema, theatre and on TV, very alluring.

Over the years I tried to experience a higher heel, by stacking two pairs of my mothers mules, one pair on top of another. I experimented with some of her other things, and that was far from unpleasant too. Years later when I got some money, I got a girlfriend to buy me some heels, saying they were for someone else. Those shoes were probably the first pair that produced an 'exotic' reaction. All through my teens, it became obvious to me, tight clothing and heels, produced 'exotic' stimulation. Could this have been the time I 'self-conditioned' myself into liking to wear a heel?

While the main cause of enjoying these these tight things or high heels may have been items associated with feminism, I did not see myself as a boy attracted to or wanting attention from men. Having a curvier body might have been useful, but I've always considered myself manly.  At worst, had I three legs, two would be in 'man camp', a third in the woman camp. Or maybe not even that much, but there is something there.

 

There was a period later, when encouraged by my girlfriend, I experimented further. It was hard work, but given the outcome of the adventures, and my hedonistic lifestyle at the time, will make great memories later in life. More conditioning?

 

Back to now, I have 'fessed up to Puffer several times, I have all the things I need here to clothe myself in quite an androgynous way. Do I? Nope. I still haven't fully decided that is me. If I get a day when I feel curious, I can play "dress up" and then store all my play clothing - probably for another year. Do I have these things, including a mountain of high heels, because of my childhood experiences? I ride a bike, as I did as a child. I do other things (I have never mentioned here) that I did as a child. Even as a 10 year old, I owned a camera I used. 

Am I doing the core things I enjoyed in my younger years, because they are fundamentally pleasurable things, or am I trying to relive my formative years? In reality of course, the reason for it makes no difference; it's done because it brings me pleasure, and at my age, I'll take whatever I can get.    

When I'm out in a flat shoe, I miss the excitement of doing something forbidden. I miss the potential of being 'spotted' doing something that causes some people to frown.  I miss being taller!  All in all, I just don't see a downside to wearing heels. And as long as I don't overdo it, I get support at home too. 

  

 

 

[Shyheels]

The excitement of doing something forbidden - exactly!

 

[Shyheels]

I did hide my feelings from myself for a good many years - certainly as regards my fancying a pair of tall (supposedly) feminine boots. I had quite innocently and openly coveted a pair of go-go boots I'd seen worn by a girl in my class when I was about 11 or 12. She wore them nearly every day. I liked them (I liked her too) and wanted a pair of go-go boots like hers. This was '69-'70 and fashion lines were blurring considerably and - ditzy as it may seem - I really didn't understand that boots could have gender. Dresses did - I knew that, and skirts too, but boots seemed to be for everybody, at least in my imagination. Anyway I made some innocent remark one day - fortunately it was sufficiently ambiguous that I could retreat from it - and was mortified to find I had been fancying a pair of girls boots. And that they were strictly girls boots. At the same time I was also vaguely outraged by the unfairness of it. I could see no reason for them to be strictly for girls, and resented the fact that this was so.

Foolishly, I regarded those precepts as 'gospel' and dispelled all thoughts of my every actual owning or wearing ostensibly feminine boots. My tastes moved on from go-go boots to other styles as I grew up, but always admired from afar, wistfully but without any hope of ever owning or wearing a pair of these curiously feminine boots. It wasn't an obsession. It was something that pretty much only came to mind during autumn when the new boot fashions are out and I would see tall elegant “women”boots on shop windows and be reminded that they were not for me, no matter how much I might have wished otherwise. 

I simple and slavishly obeyed social conventions as regards boots and fashion, but without ever actually believing in them. I do not and never have believed that adopting any form of footwear to be crossdressing. Any more than I would consider wearing, say, the colour pink, to be crossdressing. Shoes and boots, and colours, are worn by everybody. It comes down to styling, some styles (and colours) and considered 'feminine' and others not. But boots and shoes are all in the same broad unisex category - worn by all in one form or style or another, unlike skirts and dresses which, at least in Western culture, are strictly feminine. 

I might add that I have never had the least interest in cross dressing - not even out of curiosity. I've never tried on a skirt, let alone a dress, and not because I would have felt threatened by doing such a thing but because I simply had no interest or desire; I've never had a plate of liver and onions either; there is simply no appeal there.

What did appeal though were tall elegant boots. Having at long last given myself permission to buy and wear OTK suede boots, it was but a simple matter to think things through and realise that if I wanted to there was nothing wrong pushing the boat out and going for heeled boots - and stilettos, at that.  And why not. Heels had a certain regal elegance to boots and wearing them satisfies - or will satisfy - the age-old curiosity. What does it feel like to wear high heels? - even if it is a curiosity that has long gone unacknowledged.   

I find that embracing the fact that I like these supposedly strictly feminine boots, and that I fancy wearing and learning to walk well in stilettos, does not raise questions about my identity at all - instead it confirms me in my identity: I'm a regular straight guy who likes otk boots and aspires to wear stilettos well; no more no less, no confusions. It is quite clarifying. 

 

 

Edited January 8, 2018 by Shyheels

[FastFreddy2]

1 hour ago, Shyheels said:

 At the same time I was also vaguely outraged by the unfairness of it. I could see no reason for them to be strictly for girls, and resented the fact that this was so.

I am tempted to respond to each point you make, but this one about sums it up.

 

Why isn't any form of clothing free to be worn by anyone, in any social situation? Given how many very young male children enjoy wearing a dress, I suspect in 30 years the boundaries will be a little more vague, but I won't live long enough to enjoy that happening. (Although being 'senile' or at least acting like I am, might open the androgyny doors a little earlier.)  

Throughout my life I've watched things that were 'taboo' come into the mainstream, for one reason or another. Two rather obvious ones, PVC and OTK/thigh boots. These are everywhere, sold by every retailer, even the conservative ones. Plainly, I was born 40 years too early. Were I in my 20's now, I would be having the time of my life. Not that I thought otherwise when in my 20's, but now I could swim in a sea of provocatively dressed women, where before I could barely get to drink it in. Ultra high heels, no longer strictly regarded as fetish, with fashionistas paying £800 for a pair of Hot Chicks because that's what you have to pay to buy the latest/hottest high heel shoe from Louboutin. 40 years ago, same height shoe, £25 from Covergirl. The world turns ....   

 

[Shyheels]

One likes to think things will be less hidebound in 30 years time, but I am sceptical. Although certain things are more freely acceptable now - PVC and otk boots as you say - there is also, as a counterpoint, an erosion of freedoms of thought and speech, a rampant political correctness and political agendas being driven by Twitter storms and a collective risk averseness that is encroaching more and more on individual liberties. In many ways the 70s and 80s were a far more easy going period than now. 

I could, for example, easily see health and safety regulators, strident feminism, Twitter storms and fearful politicians banning high heels in the workplace - or else the lawyers fearful of lawsuits might do it on a company by company basis, with nightclubs and restaurants following suit. I am not sanguine about open societies and individual freedoms in the future...

[pointyboot]

FASCINATING discussion here, folks. I definitely echo most of the sentiments here. Nice to see it put into words.

[FastFreddy2]

I think you are right. In fact some of the big shoe retailers, seem to have stopped selling very high heels, and it can't be because they aren't fashionable. I suspect there has been H+S issues mentioned by legal teams. or even court action taken by one or two individuals that may have discouraged stupidly high heel shoes being promoted. 

You may be right about 'trials by social media too'. There seems to be an increasing tendency to berate anyone who is disinclined to 'toe the company line'. (No pun intended.) The borders of what is acceptable in social situations, seem to be narrowing over time, getting ever closer to each other. Borg mentality?

[Puffer]

1 hour ago, Shyheels said:

One likes to think things will be less hidebound in 30 years time, but I am sceptical. Although certain things are more freely acceptable now - PVC and otk boots as you say - there is also, as a counterpoint, an erosion of freedoms of thought and speech, a rampant political correctness and political agendas being driven by Twitter storms and a collective risk averseness that is encroaching more and more on individual liberties. In many ways the 70s and 80s were a far more easy going period than now. 

I could, for example, easily see health and safety regulators, strident feminism, Twitter storms and fearful politicians banning high heels in the workplace - or else the lawyers fearful of lawsuits might do it on a company by company basis, with nightclubs and restaurants following suit. I am not sanguine about open societies and individual freedoms in the future...

Very well put, SH; I agree entirely.   I would only add that the 60s were even more easy-going [think freedom of speech; increasing wealth; the Pill etc] and progressively liberating, albeit in many ways more restrained than today.

I'm not advocating that we should all be able to behave like Harvey Weinstein - but the fact remains that such conduct was widely accepted as the norm.   But I am advocating, for example, that we should be able to make a personal comment without an officious bystander reporting us to the Gestapo.

[Shyheels]

I'm not quite so sure about the 60s and 70s being a 'groper's paradise'. Harvey Weinstein actions - which amount to nothing less than rape - would hardy have been accepted let alone condoned in the 60s or 70s or any other decade. Certainly, men like him - rich, powerful, brutal - were able to get away with it then, but they were/are able to get away with it today. Weinstein's activities continued right up until last year, as did Spacey's etc.  And quite rightly he/they are being pursued and will hopefully be made to pay for their assaults and intimidation. But men - even powerful men in Hollywood - were convicted of rape and assault in the 60s and 70s too. Roman Polanski was heading for prison when he fled the US. It was Hollywood that was forgiving of him, not the US Government which to this day wants him back...

What I think is different these days is that all-too-common male boorishness - such as wolf whistles and drunken hands on knees at office Christmas parties - or even casual innocently-meant comments about someone being attractive etc is now being conflated with rape. I read a column the other day in the Independent (I think, or maybe the Guardian) where the author was condemning the fairy tale Sleeping Beauty because it supposedly glamorised sexual assault. How? Well, Prince Charming kisses Sleeping Beauty without her consent (since she was asleep, you see) to break the enchantment and this, according to the author, was sexual assault. Right. I suppose under those lights CPR could be considered the same thing... 

Edited January 9, 2018 by Shyheels

[Shyheels]

3 hours ago, FastFreddy2 said:

I think you are right. In fact some of the big shoe retailers, seem to have stopped selling very high heels, and it can't be because they aren't fashionable. I suspect there has been H+S issues mentioned by legal teams. or even court action taken by one or two individuals that may have discouraged stupidly high heel shoes being promoted. 

You may be right about 'trials by social media too'. There seems to be an increasing tendency to berate anyone who is disinclined to 'toe the company line'. (No pun intended.) The borders of what is acceptable in social situations, seem to be narrowing over time, getting ever closer to each other. Borg mentality?

It is a concern, whether for high heels or any other innocent measurable freedoms we have always taken for granted. Social media is a force that allows handfuls of noisy Twitter users to exert influence over society that far exceed their actual numbers; it allows a vocal (tiny) minority to bully the population at large, with risk averse corporations (and their lawyers) only too ready to fall into line in the wake of the dreaded "Twitter storm". It takes nothing these days to start a stampede.

 

Edited January 9, 2018 by Shyheels

[FastFreddy2]

I'm not having nightmares about these shifting sands, but I am concerned.

The line has moved, or is moving about, for what is becoming known as consent. I remember being a hormonal youth/young man, wanting sex. I can remember women being equally keen, for the same reason. We (whoever that combination might be at the time) didn't always want sex at the same time. A certain amount of coercion and/or persuasion was used by both parties, though mostly by me.  But not exclusively by me I might add. 

In my defence, I have never touched a girl or women where it wasn't expected at a time it wasn't expected. But given what I read in the newspapers, an old girlfriend (of 40 years ago) could look back on one of our encounters, and decide "I don't remember agreeing to sex on that night" and I could potentially find myself in doo-doo. Like I say, I'm not having nightmares, but I am concerned. Especially since I read the other day, a man was kept on Remand (in prison) for a year awaiting trial for rape, while the police withheld evidence that proved the man was innocent. 

[Shyheels]

Back on the topic of permissiveness and the wearing of heels, I don't really see the kinds of enlightened changes in the future where doors open as if by magic and men are suddenly being allowed to wear heels - or whatever else it may be that expresses their personalities. But then I don't think society ever works that way. These kinds of rights are not given, they must be taken, assumed. And that means risk taking and the acceptance of society's slings and arrows by the vanguard. Today we take for granted  the fact that women wear jeans and trousers - indeed multi-billion dollar fashion empires are built around women's jeans - but a century ago (even to an extent right up to the 1950s) the idea of women in trousers (let alone skinny spray-on jeans!) was radical and socially destabilising idea.

The vanguard - the bold and daring women who wore pantaloons (the bicycle had lot to do with this) - had to put up with an awful lot, but they won through by means of perseverance and thick skins. They won.  Today the idea that women in trousers and jeans was frowned upon seems laughable, almost unbelievably antiquated.

The thing is women - as a group, and individually - displayed moral courage that men just do not seem to be able to muster. If women want to adopt a style or fashion, they will do it - come what may, shrug off the comments, and own the look. Men by and large don't dare, for loads of complex reasons. Sure, a few - a very, very few - will wear heels out and about, but not many - certainly not enough to form a critical mass and effect change, influence the big fashion houses, and boot and shoe companies to create mass-market lines of men's heels, and ultimately turn the whole thing around. We are a long, long way from that and I do not see men, as a group, ever managing it. Men simply do not take those kinds of risks and if they did would be far too swift to retreat at the first bump in the road - unlike women, who soldiered on. I don't see that changing. 

 

 

  

 

     

[FastFreddy2]

1 hour ago, Shyheels said:

The thing is women - as a group, and individually - displayed moral courage that men just do not seem to be able to muster. If women want to adopt a style or fashion, they will do it - come what may, shrug off the comments, and own the look. Men by and large don't dare, for loads of complex reasons. Sure, a few - a very, very few - will wear heels out and about, but not many - certainly not enough to form a critical mass and effect change, influence the big fashion houses, and boot and shoe companies to create mass-market lines of men's heels, and ultimately turn the whole thing around. We are a long, long way from that and I do not see men, as a group, ever managing it. Men simply do not take those kinds of risks and if they did would be far too swift to retreat at the first bump in the road - unlike women, who soldiered on. I don't see that changing. 

     

As I look back over recent times (100 years), I see very few 'drivers' for change. There were two big ones (wars), a small one, (working men - as well as some women - getting the vote)  and a secret one: movement towards an internal economy.

I don't think women decided it was okay to wear trousers, world wars put women in the work place, where Mr H+S decided they had to wear trousers for safety reasons. Once the ball was rolling, the second war ensured it stayed rolling. Our internal economy recognised the clothing market had changed regarding women's casual attire, and fed that market with constant change producing a recurring market. (Think of the 'trainer' market since about 1990.)

The working class man was promised change if he fought, and change it did. Government sponsored social housing, and the welfare state. All born from politicians having to respond favourably to the voters, rather than the businesses that had previously put them in office.  Better living conditions grew expectations, and then consumerism. Internal markets flourished.

Women owning excess clothing came from that. A style for every occasion, several colours in each of those styles.... You are right about critical mass. But I believe wrong about what will drive change. If it happens, it'll be because someone found a way of convincing men they should have 30 pairs of shoes. Some with heels maybe. It's started with trainers, which after all are predominantly asexual. I know a couple of younger men who have 'collections' of trainers. These changes are slow, because of reticence, but there are indicators. 

 

[Shyheels]

The invention of the bicycle and its massive uptake among women in particular during the 1890s was a massive catalyst for change, with many sociologists, social commentators at the time  - and some of the leading suffragettes of the day - claiming that the bicycle did more to liberate women than any other single thing or event in the late 19th, early 20th century. Along with this new liberation came new ideas and new fashions - not least the need or desire to adopt  pantaloons in order to ride new dangled “safety” bicycle (as opposed to the old penny farthing) Ladies bicycles with the looping frames allowed long skirts to be worn, but pantaloons and trousers were in to stay and it was thanks to the bicycle that the big social shift began.

Women - liberated women of the age - totally decided it was time to change, to escape their cumbersome skirts and be mobile, free moving and daring. This was nothing thrust upon them but seized by daring women who took the imitative and weathered the inevitable censure that followed as a result

Sure in WWII women worked in factories and wore trousers, but the hard yards had already been out in by the liberated women at turn of the century and their bicycles. The effect of the bicycle on society was truly profound and often overlooked or forgotten today. It is worth reading. Bicycles were the smartphones of the 1890s in their overall disruptive transformative affect - especially on women and the working class.

Edited January 9, 2018 by Shyheels

[Puffer]

6 hours ago, Shyheels said:

I'm not quite so sure about the 60s and 70s being a 'groper's paradise'. Harvey Weinstein actions - which amount to nothing less than rape - would hardy have been accepted let alone condoned in the 60s or 70s or any other decade. ...

What I think is different these days is that all-too-common male boorishness - such as wolf whistles and drunken hands on knees at office Christmas parties - or even casual innocently-meant comments about someone being attractive etc is now being conflated with rape. ... 

I wasn't trying to suggest that serious sexual assault, including rape, was commonplace, let alone truly accepted, at any recent period in time.   My point - addressed later by Freddy - was that there was contemporary recognition that it did happen (or at least was alleged by victims to have happened) and was often brushed aside and not pursued at the time, but is now at risk of exposure and action decades later.   A mere allegation is now enough to get the perpetrator promptly sacked, blackballed or whatever, regardless of any independent evidence, let alone legal action.

Your second comment sums up my main concern, voiced to me by more than one other 'gentleman' friend recently.   It is becoming increasingly difficult to show or express any admiration or consideration for the opposite sex without it being regarded as a form of invasion, bordering on assault.   (And 'assault' means the mere raising of a hand or weapon rather than any subsequent impact (which is 'battery').)   Just before Christmas, I got a dirty look from a woman of about 30 because I held a shop door open for her.   But then again the pretty girl of no more than 20 who took my money in Asda was delighted when I complimented her on her long and immaculate nails.   We can't really win these days - or even know what the odds are.

As to women in trousers, I believe that it was more a question of them recognising that some type of trouser was far more comfortable and practical when carrying out manual work, particularly when this became widespread activity during WW2.   Although employers would generally have provided protective clothing for many tasks, their obligation to do so for H&S reasons scarcely existed (prior to the 1974 Act) and I suspect that it was pressure from the workers rather than their bosses that brought about the general wearing, if not the issue, of trousers and other utilitarian clothing to female workers.    And housewives followed the trend when they realised that this facilitated coping with the increased physical challenges of home-front wartime (and indeed post-war) life.

It is interesting to compare the position to that of the Great War, when women were employed on any scale for the first time in work previously done exclusively by men.   The women were still wearing skirts - usually almost to the ground - in almost every job, whether in uniform, overalls or street clothes, although there was some shift towards trousers, leggings and the like where an undivided skirt would have made their activity almost impossible.   And, interestingly, I have seen pictures of women in the 1920s who were employed to clear away sludge from the ground at a chemical works who were in trousers and rubber waders, no less!

[Shyheels]

Read the history of the bicycle - or any social history of the 1890s; that was where the fashion for women in trousers got its legs, so to speak.

 WWII was late in the game. The stage was set around the turn of the century and it was all about liberation not practicality.  

I realise WWII looms large in the British psyche as the great catalyst for 20th century change, but things were happening - and in a big way - long before the war. The war made woman in the workplace a far more common sight, but the groundwork for the adoption of trousers and pantaloons was already in place. 

Edited January 9, 2018 by Shyheels

[Puffer]

Just now, Shyheels said:

Read the history of the bicycle - or any social history of the 1890s; that was where the fashion for women in trousers got its legs, so to speak.

 WWII was late in the game. The stage was set around the turn of the century and it was all about liberation not practicality.  

I realise WWII looms large in the British psyche as the great catalyst for 20th century change, but things were happening - and in a big way - long before the war. The war made woman in the workplace a far more common sight, but the groundwork for the adoption of trousers and pantaloons was already in place. 

Yes, the bicycle paved the way and the need for practicality was as good an excuse to seek liberation as any.   I think that 'bloomers', which emerged around 1850, set the trend; they were a sort of pantaloons worn under a shorter skirt and initially met with much disapproval.

[Shyheels]

The bicycle actually changed the gene pool in Britain with research into church records showing a dramatic spike in inter-village weddings where the newlyweds came from different villages, often quite a few miles away. This upward spike closely correlates to the "bicycle craze" that gripped Britain (and the US and Europe) during the 1890s when working class men and women were revelling in their new-found mobility.    

[FastFreddy2]

Just now, Shyheels said:

 working class men and women were revelling in their new-found mobility.    

I think that's quite a romantic turn on events. Most "working class" families didn't have enough to eat, much less afford a bicycle. Middle class families or busy tradesmen maybe. Around 25% of the men who volunteered to fight in WWI were so emaciated through hunger or ill health, they were deemed unfit to fight.

Bicycles no doubt would have helped sow the seed of change in dress, but that would have affected something like 20,000 people. Even at 200,000 it would not have affected as many as were touched by WWI. That affected everyone.

 

Charlotte 'Lottie' Meade was a munitions worker during the First World War. She died of TNT poisoning contracted on duty. Her death certificate recorded that she lived in North Kensington in London. It is believed she had at least three great-grandchildren. Faces of the First World War Find out more about this First World War Centenary project at www.1914.org/faces.

This factory worker is not wearing a skirt, though she looks to be wearing her corset still. 

 

 

I'm not suggesting a switch was 'flicked' that immediately saw women wearing trousers, but it opened the door to everyone, that in certain circumstances, it was seemly for working class women (the great bulk of women) to wear a trouser. 

 

 

Not only did society get forced into accepting women in a trouser, skirts got shorter too. Ankles were no longer hidden.

 

This could be debated ad infinitum as the learned Puffer would say.  The point I'm making is that it wasn't a fashion house that decided it was okay for women to start the long road of being unsuppressed chattels. The Great War had women doing men's jobs, in men's clothes - or a version of them. 1918 gave some women the vote (along with working class men over the age of 21). "Freedom" was in the air. Right up until the 20's and 30's with people once again starving to death, with no work for the poor. It wasn't until WWII that the movement could continue.

Later on, (lat 40's to mid 50's) when (borrowed) money started slushing around, fashion houses/theatres and film started to pave the way to women in trousers to be a fashion statement, not work attire. Yes, bicycles may well have sown a seed, but the wars changed how we ALL dress.

 

[Shyheels]

Not romantic at all. The bald truth. The bicycle affected millions - literally millions - and was highly affordable by working class men and women who bought in droves - that was what was so ground-breaking about it. For the first time in history the lower and working class had mobility - something that hitherto had been the gift of the middle class and wealthy.

HG Wells - who was a very observant social commentator aside from being a futurist - wrote several 'cycling novels' in the 1890s where the bicycle as a vehicle for social change and mobility had a starring role - The Wheels of Chance and Mr Polly being two of these works. Bicycles were very much the vehicle of the radical fringe in society, bed-sit socialists, marxists and union radicals, suffragettes. 

It was a worldwide phenomenon. In Australia the bicycle was the near-universal means of transport for itinerant shearers, men of sharply limited means, who roved the outback, looking for work from station to station. 

People have truly forgotten just how big deal the bicycle was. If you read a bit of the history of the bicycle it is a real eye-opener

I agree with you - it was no fashion house that decided women should be free, it was women themselves.

And my original point was that women showed far more boldness and moral courage than men ever have when it comes to fashion and wearing whatever it is they want to wear. They still do to this day. A woman would not think twice about buying a man's shirt, jeans, boots or shoes, where most men would turn bright pink and run the other way.

Edited January 9, 2018 by Shyheels

[FastFreddy2]

Just now, Shyheels said:

It was a worldwide phenomenon. In Australia the bicycle was the near-universal means of transport for itinerant shearers, men of sharply limited means, who roved the outback, looking for work from station to station. 

We are talking about the UK ....

It's not possible to 'pick and choose' countries to add weight to a view. Yes bicycles brought about a revolution in transport, and China - home to a quarter of the worlds total population - could not function without them now. But the effects you describe were not felt by the British working class. As I said, a significant percentage were too busy starving to death. The famous Jarrow March was done on foot, not on bicycle.

Bicycles were not the driver to women wearing trousers.

[Shyheels]

Bicycles did drive fashion and the move by women into wearing trousers - it is a rather widely accepted premise by social and fashion historians.

And the bicycle was very much a British working class thing - although it swiftly became a worldwide phenomenon. Indeed, the bicycle craze in America saw literally millions being sold annually and the US Patent Offices busy with new cycliing patents they had to open a separate building just to handle patents in the cycling trade. 

But Britain was ground zero.  The modern bicycle as we know it was a British invention - John Kemp Starley in 1885. Its popularity as a means of transport was ably supported by the invention of a Scottish veterinarian named Dunlop who came up with the pneumatic tyre, a couple of years later, making the ride comfortable on the rough country roads of the time.  It was cheap, reliable, swift and easily maintained. From the very beginning bicycles and cycling had strong working class roots.

Oddly enough - or perhaps typically - within a very few years cheap American made bicycles were dominating the market here. 

I have written and edited books on cycling history.. I know this stuff really well

 

PS: I just looked up the cycling figures for Britain 1895 - 1.5 million cyclists. And that number continued to grow quickly through the rest of the decade.

 

 

Edited January 9, 2018 by Shyheels