INCREASE IN SIZE OF WOMEN’S FEET

Southland Times, Issue 23948, 14 October 1939, Page 12

INCREASE IN SIZE OF WOMEN’S FEET

Women’s feet as the years go by are becoming larger and larger, and larger, states a writer in The Evening Standard, London. Only two years ago manufacturers announced that the average size of a woman’s shoe was 5. This year it is size 6.

Sizes 8 and 9 were not usually stocked by shoe shops a few years ago. There was no general demand for them; women with size 9 shoes were “extraordinary.” Today stores all over the country stock that size regularly, and find that they are selling more and more of them, the Boot Trade Association said. The old idea that women in Mayfair have smaller feet than their suburban or country cousins is no longer true. The increase in size is general, whether in town or country. Experts say that women’s larger feet are due to spread of athletics —tramping, cycling, golf and all outdoor sports. Women no longer care what size they take in shoes. The time has gone when she will try and squeeze her feet into shoes one and a-half sizes too small for her,'for the modern trend in shoe manufacture is to conceal length or breadth of foot with simplicity of line and design. “Decorated” leathers, which are popular this year, have a shortening' effect, and suggest smallness. In 1939 only an expert can tell the difference between a size 5 and a size 7 on a girl’s foot. So if she wants sevens she wears them.