Word: shoes
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Last season women were still able to zero in on occasional slim-heeled, delicate models. These days, it is a staggering task to find a shoe that does not qualify by sheer weight as a lethal weapon, and by overall appearance as the biggest drag on feet since the ball and chain...
...move against graceful footwear started slowly several years ago. Miniskirts get much of the blame: so much leg exposure, it was decided, required a heavy shoe. Accordingly rounded toes were first blunted slightly, next squared off enough to boot field goals. Heels grew plump, then squatted as if to take root. Still, all was not lost: vamps stayed high-cut and flattering, and flimsy straps crossed ankles and insteps without looking like tourniquets. But then came clogs. Wooden-soled and styled like gravy boats, the Swedish imports and U.S. copies did a sellout business last year. After sport shoes went...
...Have you got the Uglies yet?" ask the ads for Los Angeles' Jay Jordan Shoe Stores. Jordan's does, including a high wedgie sandal with heavy straps, all in snakeskin, that prompted one potential buyer to say "I'd rather wear the boxes they came in." The bestseller at Bonwit Teller in Boston is a broad-banded, thick-soled platform sandal. The hottest number at Chicago's Thayer McNeil is a dark-stained wooden shoe that turns up at toe and heel and stays on because of leather straps nailed hard and fast over the instep...
Patrons at Manhattan's Shoe Biz at Bendel are as fond of the red patent chunky-toed, chunky-heeled style as they are of the white version; it has a platform as high as its heel and is wrapped over and over with what appear to be Ace bandages. Not all monsters are sandals, of course. Some are sturdy leather brogues with heels extending beyond the back of the shoe; others have tongues that take their licks at the ankles, leaving even the slimmest tarsus looking like a giant redwood...
...Shoe manufacturers insist that next fall will see a "more feminine" look to shoes. It seems a safe prediction: monsters could hardly get more monstrous. Meantime, with a summer still to get through, the only feasible alternative remains that old standby-the black-soled, five-toed barefoot...