Tango Shoe Divas

It’s that time of year isn’t it. I got this question twice in comments so I thought I would throw it out to the ladies in general.

From a MALE user:
“I know she reads Tango Shoe Diva so everything will be written with strict confidentiality using only anonymous pronouns; but what do you think of a woman who refuses to let her man (and tango partner) buy new shoes with the claim “but you just bought me new pair of ‘Comme Il Faut’ shoes”? The term ‘fetish’ has even been tossed about by this lovely lady when I complain I need to purchase another pair for her. Valentine’s Day is just around the corner. Is it me … or her? Comments please?”

From my point of view there are two possibilities here, one is the “Oh, honey, you don’t need to buy me anything!” but she will be secretly thrilled. It IS Valentines Day after all and CiF ARE jewelry for the feet. On the other hand, if she’s really serious then you risk her being angry for not listening to her. I know that the more tango shoes I own, the more particular I get about adding new ones to the collection… I’ve become a regular control freak about what goes on my feet. I am only looking for very particular combinations of styles, colors and heel heights, so make sure that you can make a good selection for her on those factors before you decide to go ahead and buy shoes for her anyway.

And on the subject of shoe fetish… Join the club. I think there are a lot of mild shoe fetishists amongst the tango leaders. I am fond of saying that Tango is the only safe place for a straight man to openly notice and admire women’s footwear. Heck, we spend $200 a pair on them, we’d be disappointed if you guys didn’t appreciate them a little…

And for you and all the other Shoe Fetishists out there, here is a picture of me and my “Shoe Sister” when we realized that we had perfectly matching nail polish to each other’s shoes!

It’s been sooooo long since I bought any new shoes… My last pair were at the beginning of November! That’s almost three months with NO new shoes. I was going into withdrawl. So I splurged… naughty, naughty, naughty. I would try to justify it by the fact that I have a great skirt to go with the first pair, and really no silver stilettos, but really at this point no one believes my rationalizations at all. So I will just shut up and make with the shoe pr0n…

Yes I love them and I hate them, but I can’t stop buying them, it’s Darcos! I need platform shoes, but these are pretty… Now to wait, and wait and wait. I hope they manage to stay a little closer to their advertised timeline this time… Last time it was 10 weeks, I’ll have the tango shoe junkie shakes by then. Now if I can just resist bidding on any of the new pairs they listed today… these especially…

soooo pretty. I don’t have quite that shade of lavender yet. No! Someone else bid on them, pleeeeeaaaaase!

While my Love/Hate relationship with Darcos has been discussed thoroughly, I have managed to convince myself to order another pair (which I am NOT going to show you yet…) and in convincing myself that I deserve yet another pair of shoes, I also seem to have enabled one of my friends.

So here is my dilemma. Both I and the other shoe diva wear a size 7.5 and have gotten a perfect fit by ordering down a half size (ie a size 7). I had to discover this by ordering one pair that don’t fit particularly well. But my other friend friend wears a tiny size 6! It seems so extreme to tell her to order a size 5.5, but I hate for her to have to go through the wrong sizing issues that I did.

So does anyone ELSE have any experience with sizing and Darcos, especially if you have tiny, tiny little feet? (Her feet are so small I don’t know how she balances to dance!)

And because it would be a boring post without a picture, here is a dose of SHOES!

Bonus points if you can tell me what pair of shoes belong to me!

This is from a comment left on a previous post. Does anyone want to offer some advice?

“Love to read your stuff! I started tango March ‘07 using ballroom shoes. Have my first pair of 3″ CiF, but also need some comfortable “get me thru the night” shoes as I’ve worked on my feet all my life.

Please recommend some favorites by brand, style and heel height if you can. Also, what do you wear to class? Many thanks!

Comment by Luvshuz2 — December 18, 2007″

I am designing my “dream team”. Much like the male version of this pastime I have to draw from existing players, but I can make my own combination that is much better than anything in existence. I now own 7 (?!?!) pair of CiF and while I love them, the recent festival reminded me that I need to get back to my platform roots. After 45+ hours of tango I was down to two pair of shoes that I could stand to put on my feet, my bestest go-to pair that are beginning to be a bit worn but are as comfortable as 3.5 inch heels can be, and my platform Tara “Alma” Pair but Tara doesn’t have anything that I really need (need of course being a subjective term when you own 20 pair of tango shoes…) I am a bit in love with these, and I don’t have a plain pair of cherry red shoes… I was hoping that she would be at the festival, once they were on my feet I might have not let them go, plus I wanted to try the memory foam thing out in person…

It still could happen, but in the meantime… I have been on the hunt for green… A desperate quest in fact. Before tango, green was my favorite color and I never red. And we all know what happens when we start tango. Very quickly a normal, colorful closet becomes frighteningly bichromatic, black and red, practically a uniform for the nascent tango dancer. My tango shoe collection, which really started to grow in my sixth year of tango when I was SO over red, has no such problem – the most represented color (not lack of color – which would be black) is red, but it is closely followed by blue, purple and pink. I admit, I do have one pair of green shoes but I don’t love, either in color, or fit and balance. And I occasionally see a pair of CiF that are ok but nothing that makes me want to throw down $190.

So it is time to try something different. So lets play Fantasy Footwear. Courtesy of Tango Wear

First the model:
This part is easy. I’ve had my eye on this style for a long time (pretty much since the model came out). I have one friend who ordered them and went back for a second color. What seals the deal is that they will put a platform on them. Comfort plus the look of a stiletto would make this tanguera absolutely ecstatic.

Now for the hard part, finding the perfect color combination!

For the suede, the first picture is the ideal (CiF of course – I am tempted to buy that pair, as they are gorgeous, but I really, really need less 4″ heels!) and the second is a color from a pair of Tango Wear shoes. I have emailed the first picture to them to see if they have something closer to the CiF color (they are very nice to communicate with).

If they have a different suede, then I think I want to go with the more classic green metallic in the first picture. But their suede combined with the second metallic could be more unique… I also have an inquiry in about whether I can get a metallic stiletto to match. Yum!

So that is today’s episode of “Fantasy Footwear” (and I think I need a new category for this game!). Anyone want to vote? Hmmmm. I might have to work on poll functionality!