Pair of shoes, for bound feet, silk satin; embroidering in silk threads; cotton and wood, China, 1850-1950

Pair of identical women’s shoes for bound feet, with the lower half of the uppers in black silk satin edged with blue satin and embroidered with flower sprig motifs in green, pink and grey silk thread. The upper halfs are in bright purple cotton. They have slightly curled toes that extend from the cotton-covered two-piece wooden sole. The shoes have large heel tabs lined in dark blue and secure straps that connect the tab to the shoe's upper.

The main segments of the shoes are of black cotton embroidered in pale blue, pale green, beige, red and white silk with a flower sprig on either side of the front. The top edges are bound with mid-blue bias-cut cotton and black cotton piping with an insert of bright purple cotton. A large tab of indigo blue cotton is secured to each of the heels of the shoes to help ease them on. Sewn to these tabs and curving down from them on either side are narrow 'straps' of the same cotton. These 'straps' are then sewn to the top edge of the shoes to give extra leverage or perhaps to hold a lace of some sort to be tied across the front. There are spots of bright colour sewn as reinforcements where the 'straps' are joined to the main part of the shoe. These may be fragments of narrow ribbon binding or close oversewing. There is the same bright pink spot in the crook of the curled up toes. The shoes are lined with mid-blue plain cotton.

The heels and soles are of gently arched wood covered in pale blue, bright pink and white cotton with a narrow black cotton strip inserted around the heels where the raised heels join the soles. The bases of the soles are quilted all over with straight lines of white stitches.

Given by the Beverley Jackson Collection

Northwestern- or Southwestern-style pumps for bound feet. The shoes are identical (with the exception of a sticky label on the sole of one of the shoes) as the process of binding - and thus deforming - the foot means that it is not possible to tell the right from the left shoe.

On the base of one shoe is a paper sticky label which reads in English 'Shen County, Zhejiang Prov.' This is presumably the donor's writing. She purchased this pair of shoes, according to an email in the registered file in 1999, 'in the Kunming area' although Kunming is not in Zhejiang province. She goes on to say that a Chinese lady she met there was wearing similar, though less décorated, shoes. According to the collector, this is the only area where Han Chinese women still make their own shoes and put décoration on them."

According to Dorothy Ko, this pair's cotton upper, simple construction and relatively flat sole with its slightly upturned nose are characteristic of "minority shoes" from the Northwest and Southwest regions of China which are less complicated in design and construction and seldom made of silk.

Description at accession:
Gift

Some wear, reddish staining on heel, grubbiness on mid-blue edging

L. across bottom of sole 11.5 cm
L. from back to tip of toe, across aside 12.5 cm

Shoe, for a woman's bound foot (one of a pair with FE.48:2-1999 see over)
China, 1900-1980

Cotton shoe, with a curled-up toe, tailored with tiny hand stitches

The main segment of the shoe is of black cotton embroidered in pale blue, pale green, beige, red and white silk with a flower sprig on either side of the front. The front top edge is bound with mid-blue bias-cut cotton and black cotton piping with an insert of bright purple cotton. A large tab of indigo blue cotton is secured to the heel of the shoe to help ease the shoe on. Sewn to this tab and curving down from it on either side are narrow 'straps' of the same cotton. These 'straps' are then sewn to the top edge of the shoe to give extra leverage or perhaps to hold a lace of some sort to be tied across the front. There are spots of bright colour sewn as reinforcements where the 'straps' are joined to the main part of the shoe. These maybe fragments of narrow ribbon binding or close over-sewing. There is the same bright pink spot in the crook of the curled-up toe. The shoe is lined with mid-blue plain cotton.

The heel and sole are of wood covered in pale blue, bright pink and white cotton with a narrow black cotton strip inserted around the heel where the raised heel joins the sole. The base of the sole is quilted all over with straight lines of white stitches.

FE.48:1&2-1999