I have my final festive footwear from the recent Irregular Choice collection to share tonight. On launch day, these immediately caught my eye because of the pretty, pastel colours and how different they were to the other more traditional red, gold and green pairs. I thought the same thing last year about Sweet Ginger Love, which were (very sadly) too low heeled for me. They of course, tell the story of The Nutcracker with the soldier on one shoe and sugar plum fairy on the other. I was a ballet dancer when I was younger and we put on The Nutcracker production one year, I must've been 11 or 12. I got to be a...rat, the King Rat, but still a rat. I was gutted, I wanted the big dresses and layers of net, but alas we had to stitch a tail onto grey leggings from Happit and rummage through a pile of charity shop 'treasures' our teacher bought (I ended up with an oversized mustard shirt and cropped sequin waistcoat). We had swords and had a whole dance situated around sword fighting. Not the glamour I hoped for! Anyway, it was my birthday at the time and my childhood school friend bought me a teddy bear with a red bow around it's neck and I named it Clara, after the main character in The Nutcracker. I still have Clara, for about 20 years, I couldn't sleep without her, she went everywhere with me, even just overnight stays.
Anyway back to the shoes, although not overtly Christmassy, they do still have little bits here and there like the candy cane stripes and of course the Nutcracker soldiers who have become so popular over the years as Christmas decorations. My parents were out walking last week and saw a massive outdoor one on the balcony of a house. I'd love to photograph my shoes with it! As you can see I also bought the matching tights and I spoke about the handbag too in my latest bag collection post. I figured I might as well go the whole hog and get the full set!
I suppose the basic shape of these is a bit like some of the Perspex heeled T-bar styles we see throughout the year. I can vary in sizes between those, sometimes they cut into the top of my foot and these do too. Right at the chocolate bit where the shoe meets your foot; it's very tight. I know my feet are a little bigger this year due to gaining weight, so I'm going to persevere with them and either hope they stretch or I lose weight! They were hard to get into with bare feet but with tights they are fine. I didn't find sizing issues anywhere else, length and width elsewhere felt true to size. I love the strap and buckle on these, so easy to use. I also like that the end of the strap can be tucked out of the way of the detail up the side of the shoe. Often this isn't factored in (the flamingo Miami immediately spring to mind). I love the fluffy beard and the extra detail...they play music! I have a video, but I'm having trouble uploading it here without altering the rest of my post, but they play the Sugar Plum Fairy tune from The Dance Of The Sugar Plum Fairy. I've uploaded it to Tumblr here, you don't need an account to view it. There's an on/off button on the inner side of the shoe and then the speaker is in one heel (the black dot in the 3rd last photo), then when you click your heel or walk, it plays the tune. It's very loud, quite short, but oh so cool. It's also rechargeable, so will never run out. If you missed my previous posts, Advent Adventures are here and Sleigh Ride that light up are here.
Wearing: Nutcracker tights, Irregular Choice (current).
Fit: 4" heel, no platform. Buckle fastening on strap, generous strap and easy buckle. I went for my usual size (38/5) and they are very tight across the top of the foot (the chocolate coloured bit). Length wise they felt true to size and no width issues anywhere else.
Comfort: Once I've stretched these a bit, they should be comfier. Nice big solid heel to walk on.
These are amazing and love the tights too :-D
ReplyDeleteThank you x
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