By the way, real Mainers can't afford to shop at LLBean.
And with Burberry and Nine West there who the hell wants to even look at a duck shoe anyway? For real native casual shoes I will stick with clam diggers and weejuns.
A quick shoe primer:
Tan shoes off season: Pumps, never, a seude slouch boot, okay. Non-boot wise, try to go with richer browns or an ox blood.
White shoes still in? They are a pita, but sometimes unavoidable...and spectator pumps are a must when trying to find a shoe to wear with dressy red, red is a bitch to match. Have the red/white spectator pump on hand for this. They are also good in navy/white.
Two tone shoes are good in general, because David Selby wears them, and that is reason enough (see, I am on topic here).
Heels....you can never have enough variance in heel inch. Great fitting jeans are hard to find, hemming is bitch....so much easier just to have shoes to accomodate the length of the jeans. For the vertically challenged, such as myself (I am way too short for my weight), a slim leg jean that is too long, but whose length is corrected by a stack heeled Nine West oxford is the holy grail. I advise these Nine Wests in both black and chocolate brown with all the heel variation there is out there. To keep to the LL Bean topic here, let me say that this is the perfect place to insert the following: LL Bean sizing sucks. LL Bean cut sucks.
Flats: Created for the sole purpose of wearing with leggings, which, fahion mavens be damned, will never be out of style if you have small thighs and butt. Industry wants to dictate to the flat tummied, well I can't change that, but I can hold on to my leggings.
Black patent leather Mary Janes? Not just for the parochial school girl anymore, wear them til your 90.
Flip flops? For running errands, go for it, but for the love of god leave off the plastic doo-dahs. Something with a sole that doesn't scream shower room at the Y is a given.
Burberry check slides? Will everyone who has lemminged this pattern and made it trendy please move on to the next thing so that I can go back to wearing the ones I have had for years without looking like a charter member of the Oprah Book Club? Thank You.
Boots....here you are financially screwed, because with real winters you have too many bases to cover. Style and function tend to not over lap well....so you have to have both, and of course you need black, brown, neutral. White...nonononono. Not even good on majorettes. If you are not planning on dancing topless in a cage, do not buy white boots. A cream or rich ivory is good, though.
You can trust me on knowing my boot thing, I was caught once not having the right boot....dark, but not frivolous, and definately not utilitarian a couple of years ago when I had a family funeral with snow on the ground. Since if I had worn the wrong boot, I would hope to hell they would be burying me, I wore pumps. I then was asked to be a pall bearer (ironic since this was the blood relative I would l have least wanted to put in a grave).
I am now boot ready. Bring anything on.
I do not own a pair of Bean boots, and have not since 1978. You need that good solid boot to shovel out the car or schlepp to the corner store, but give me a Bass shitkicker any day.
The final word on shoes: Ladies, you must own a pair of FMPs.
Nancy
