Earlier this year, Paul and I got engaged. Presumably this means that at some point in the future there will be a wedding. So, of course, I did what any ridiculously addicted freshly engaged woman would do – I went shoe shopping.
I saw a pair of shoes, by Irregular Choice. I saw them on the Schuh website, and I went into my local branch to try them on. Two weeks later, after I’d been paid, I went back to buy the shoes. And they’d gone. No longer for sale in the shop, no longer online.
(I may have said a rude word. A nice man is trying to mail order a pair for me. He’ll let me know.)
This evening I was browsing on Amazon, when I remembered that they sell shoes too! I had a little look, and I found what I thought were the shoes I was coveting. Then I looked a little closer, and realised that whilst they looked a bit like my shoes, they weren’t my shoes at all.
(Click for larger)
The shoes at the top are the ones that I’m coveting. (I couldn’t find pictures of the cream and gold, so I’m showing you the red in both styles, for a more accurate comparison.)
See how the toes are extremely pointy, and the strap is quite low down?
See how the heels are higher, and more shapely, and self-covered?
See how the suede is different?
These are, quite emphatically, not the same shoes.
Yet they’re made by the same company, at the same price, and sold under the same name. How peculiar.
I’m sure that plenty of people will be looking at the picture and wondering what on earth I’m fussing about. Yes, the shoes are very similar. But to me (and I realise this is merely a matter of opinion), the top shoes look glamorous and elegant and sumptuous and lovely. The others look somehow mediocre and cheap.
If I hadn’t seen the top shoes first, would I be coveting the others? It’s impossible to say. But I know that if I can get a pair of the cream and gold ones by mail order, if they’re the same style as the bottom pair, I’m sending them back.
