Cheerful shoes

There are all kinds of reason for choosing to wear particular clothes. Some people pick clothes for confidence, or want to look sexy or fit in with a particular group. I tend to choose clothes that are fun and make me smile: bright colours, quirky details, interesting patterns. Which is why I ended up buying these shoes the other day, because they were such a lovely cheerful colour and I knew the bows would make me smile every time I looked down at my feet.

Necklace – Fair Trade shop
Cardigan – Monsoon
Top – Gap
Skirt – made by me
Tights – Debenhams
Shoes – Office

I appear to be getting quite a reputation at work for having fabulous shoes, which surprises me a little as I have always found it so hard to buy shoes. Maybe I’m just getting better at picking out the pairs that do work for me and not buying boring shoes just because they’re what tends to be available. I’ve always agreed with William Morris’s exhortation to “have nothing in your house that you do not know to be useful, or believe to be beautiful”, but better than either is managing to combine the two and have things which are both useful and beautiful!

Casting clouts

The spring is still two or three weeks behind, so I doubt the May blossom will be out any time soon, but this week’s warm weather has had me digging my summer frocks out of the back of the wardrobe and even venturing into sheer tights rather than opaques. I have to say, I’m not a big fan of sheer tights, but I bought some more expensive pairs last summer and they’re definitely better than the cheap multipack pairs I usually buy; they stay up really well, haven’t laddered, and don’t feel as unpleasantly nylony as the cheaper ones. I went out and bought more at lunchtime, because they really are the best option for cool summer days if I want to look smart for work and still wear skirts and dresses; sometimes opaque tights just feel too heavy.

Shawl – Isaura
Dress – East
Shoes – Camper

I’ve been a little wary of wearing shawls with short-sleeved things, but I actually think this looks fine. I mostly chose the outfit because I had a meeting with a colleague who also knits and wanted to have something to show off; yes, I really am that shallow! My spotty Camper shoes also seemed to attract a lot of compliments today. Clearly it was a good outfit all round, despite its simplicity!

Yesterday’s news

I didn’t post yesterday, because I went to London again. This time it was for work (I was attending a conference on tax) although I also managed to fit in coffee with one friend at Paddington before she started work and I headed on to the conference, lunch with another friend who works in the same building the conference was held in, and a trip to Loop and Ray Stitch afterwards where I met up with two more friends and had a chat with a third who was working in Loop. It ended up feeling like a bit of a holiday, but it was also a rather long day (I left the house at 6am and didn’t get home until after 9pm) and even though I had managed to nip outside and take a photo of my outfit at quarter to six in the morning I really didn’t feel like posting when I got home.

I had spent quite a while planning out what I was going to wear. It was a work thing, so I wanted to look smart, but it was also London, so needed to be comfortable. And as I was meeting knitters there obviously had to be something handknitted in there. (Someone did helpfully point out on Twitter that she thought ‘smart, comfy and includes handknits’ pretty much described all my work outfits, but this had to be more so on every count.) Also, the forecast suggested that it was going to be warm and I didn’t want to end up sweltering or having to negotiate packed Tubes carrying armfuls of discarded layers.

Obviously, in the end I just went for the three-quarter-sleeves, opaque tights and shawl formula that’s been working so well for me lately.

Shawl – Citron
Dress – Mary Portas
Tights – M&S
Shoes – Arche

I am now considerably closer to feeling that these shoes really were worth the money, because they stood up wonderfully to a day in London. My feet were sore by the end of the day, but that was only to be expected after a day that involved a lot of standing and walking; the shoes didn’t rub, didn’t fall off and felt soft and cushioned and comfortable, but unlike most of the other shoes I have that I might choose to wear to London they also looked smart and professional and not clumpy and more casual. Now as long as they don’t end up wearing out ridiculously quickly I think I may have found my perfect brand of shoes, price or no price!

The one with the incredibly expensive shoes

Today, I finally got to wear my incredibly expensive shoes. I bought them in Bath when I spent an afternoon there with my friend S recently, because they were a gorgeous colour and soft and have cushioned soles and are the only pair of court shoes I have ever found that actually stay on my feet rather than pinging off my heels at every step I take. All of which are still true, but I’m not quite sure if that justifies spending the same on what is, when all’s said and done, a pair of very lightweight pumps, as I would expect to pay for knee-high boots.

Shawl – Godiva
Top – Gap
Skirt – Dorothy Perkins
Tights – Debenhams
Shoes – Arche

They are very pretty, though. And hopefully I’ll get lots of wear out of them this summer to justify the cost!

Friday florals

Today’s outfit was rather thrown together after I couldn’t find the vest to go under the dress I was planning on wearing (I swear my clothes keep disappearing, one of my bras seems to have vanished completely). Unfortunately that meant I didn’t get to debut the fabulous but incredibly expensive shoes I bought in Bath a couple of months ago, but I did get to wear my new dress. I found this in M&S and was amazed to have actually managed to find something with sleeves, a reasonably modest neckline and a skirt that reaches my knees. Exactly the kind of dress I had despaired of finding anywhere!

Dress and jacket – M&S
Brooch – Susan Sharpe on etsy
Shoes – Clarks

Anyway, it’s the end of another week, and tomorrow I am off to London to meet up with some knitters. The only trouble is, I have no idea what to wear – I may be managing to ease my working wardrobe into spring but I’m at a bit of a loss for casual wear. Or at least, I’m at a loss about footwear; I really don’t want to wear knee-high boots because I’m sick to death of boots, but I’m not brave enough to wear leggings and shoes with bare feet just yet. I could wear leggings and shoes with handknitted socks, but I’m a little concerned that would go beyond ‘quirky and creative’ into ‘dotty bag lady’ territory. Or would it be OK?

(I also need to find some backup knitting for tomorrow, as I’m not sure that the heel and foot of a sock for me is going to be enough.)

Blue shoes

The snow continues (boo! hiss! I am so tired of winter already), so today I wore my blue suede shoes and ended up matching them with my Scroll Lace scarf, which I haven’t worn for a long time.

Scarf – Scroll Lace
Jacket – Jigsaw
Dress – East
Shoes – Clarks

Spotty shoes

There’s still enough snow around to make me disinclined to go outside without changing into my wellies, so I thought I’d wear the spotty shoes I bought from Camper over Christmas to work today.

Jacket – Debenhams
Necklace – made by Helen
Dress – LK Bennett
Camisole and tights – M&S
Shoes – Camper

I did take a photo of the shoes, but apparently photographing your own feet at 6:45am isn’t as easy as you might think and it came out a bit blurry.

One of the reasons I bought the shoes was that I’d heard that Camper were fairly narrow, and they don’t slip much at the heel (at least worn with woolly tights). They’re definitely comfortable as heels go and the heels are surprisingly stable, but they are quite narrow in the toes and the straps appear to be designed for someone with a lower instep than me and did dig in to the tops of my feet a bit. I guess Camper aren’t my secret footwear saviour after all, though they weren’t bad and did got lots of compliments…

Don’t you step on my blue suede shoes

It’s not often you’ll find me out of knee-high boots at this time of year, but the weather is quite mild at the moment and I simply couldn’t resist giving my new blue suede shoes an outing.

Shawl – Elektra
Dress – Mary Portas
Tights – M&S
Shoes – Clarks

I was rather taken with these shoes when I spotted them in Clarks back in the autumn, but Clarks shoes are generally a bit too wide for me and I didn’t need shoes. And then I wandered into the local branch on Thursday lunchtime and saw that they had one pair in the sale, and they just happened to be a 6, and when they still had them on Friday I decided it was Meant To Be, tried them on and was surprised to discover that they were actually a pretty good fit and didn’t flap up and down like Clarks shoes usually do. And I love the colour. Every time I looked down at my feet today it made me smile.

Bootless

Having one pair of boots at the menders’ and the other drying out meant I had to wear shoes today. Which wasn’t a problem; really, my office is warm enough that boots are probably a bit superfluous, and with woolly tights I was warm enough outside as well. I could wear shoes more often, if it wasn’t so hard to find any that fit comfortably that I can hardly wait for boot-wearing weather to come round. Why can’t shoes be as comfortable as boots?

Necklace – made by Helen
Cardi – shop in Coventry about 13 years ago
Dress – Boden
Camisole and woolly tights – M&S
Shoes – Clarks

New dress and uncomfortable shoes

I was browsing online shops a couple of months ago when I spotted this dress in the sale at LK Bennett and decided it was very much my kind of thing. It’s the same style as my red dress, which I also love, though I’m not sure either one photographs all that well; it’s very nice to wear, though, and got several compliments.

Shawl – Elektra
Dress – LK Benett
Tights – M&S
Shoes – Clarks

I was going to wear the dress with boots, but the weather is still quite mild. I didn’t think it would really go with brown or red, so I went for these purple Clarks shoes even though they’re really not very comfortable at all. It’s a shame, when they’re so pretty, but I’m very glad to be home and in my slippers now!