Italian Kid High Heels

High heels were introduced into Western dress around the turn of the seventeenth century. Men were the first to wear heels but women soon followed and by the end of the century women’s heels had reached unprecedented heights. Female beauty ideals at that time included small feet. It should be no surprise that Charles Perrault wrote Cinderella in 1697. High heels enabled women to hide the majority of their foot under their skirts, allowing only the tiny tips of their shoes to show giving the illusion of a small foot. This pair of women's shoes features leather uppers with polychrome embroidery in a floral design with stems and leaves, as well as needlepoint toe shapes.