Twentieth century high heels...

In the early twentieth century, women became the majority demander of high heeled shoes. They started demanding more confortable, flat-soled shoes. That is until the roaring twenties, where higher hemlines encouraged higher footwear. The depressin in the 1930s influenced Western

shoe fashion as heels became lower and wider.

Hollywood however gave the new heel an elegant look. In the 1940s, luxury items were in short supply due to World war 2 and high heels tended to stay moderately high and thick.

The revival of western high fashion in the post-war 1950s was led by a French designer, Christian Dior and shoe designer Roger Vivier. Together they developed the stiletoes. Stileto actually means a small dagger with a slender blade in Italian. They were first mentioned in the London's daily telegram on September 10th 1953. The exaggerated slender heel and narrowing of the toe gave a woman sheer height and a strong character look. They were often banned from public building as they caused physical damage to floors.

However, feminists moved to get rid of the stileto as it was thought to be man's way of crippling the woman when in the need to run away from male violence.




info sources: http://www.randomhistory.com/1-50/036heels.html