42 13 February 2021 | The Guardian Weekend
It’s the little things that get to me at the moment.
I miss kind bus drivers who wait for you to leg it
to their stop in the rain. I miss being awed by the
coff ee art skills of London baristas on a daily basis.
And I really, really miss wearing boots with a heel.
High-heeled boots are up there with snow and
Christmas Eve as one of the few truly glamorous
things about winter. Nothing in the wardrobe
holds a candle to a great heeled boot when it
comes to grown-up glamour. There is something
deeply satisfying about their snug solidity, which
radiates confi dence and competence. A woman
who orders her pre-dinner cocktail without
consulting the menu and would keep her cool in
a crisis.
But this winter, the heeled boot has barely had
a look in. These are boots you wear when you
are leaving the house in order to
go indoors elsewhere : a cafe, the
cinema, parents’ evening. At the
moment, the only time I go out of
the house to go indoors elsewhere is
to go to the supermarket. (Actually,
that’s not quite true – I went to
the dentist, which was an exciting
change of scene. But not exactly
worth putting on heels for.) My local
park is a mud bath, and I am way
too out of practice with heels to risk
them on a trek anywhere further
afi eld. Now and again I change into a
vaguely dressy outfi t for a Saturday
night (not a cocktail dress, just
something that’s not jeans and a
jumper ) but that calls for a pair of slingbacks I can
easily kick off in front of the TV.
Maybe I’m getting this all wrong. After all, most
of the things I miss right now aren’t within my
power to bring back, but there’s nothing stopping
me putting on a great pair of boots with a dress.
They could be just the thing to put a spring back
into my step, during the one-fl ight-of-stairs
commute to my desk. In a winter short on sparkle,
a smart boot is a high-kick of glamour, and if there
was ever a season to channel drinking a cocktail
and staying cool in a crisis, this is surely the one.
On the other hand, a heeled boot is timeless.
And there’s always next winter The
wardrobe
remix
Missing
glamour?
Try a
heeled boot
1 Lace-ups, £185, uterque.com
2 Olive green, £35.99, mango.com
3 Tan, £220, dunelondon.com
4 Blue velvet, £110, boden.co.uk
5 Red, £45, riverisland.comJess wears red dress, £229, allsaints.com.
Croc-eff ect boots, from a selection by Loeffl er
Randall, loeffl errandall.com. Earrings, Jess’s own3
Fashion Jess Cartner-Morley
PHOTOGRAPHER: DAVID NEWBY. STYLING: MELANIE WILKINSON. HAIR AND MAKEUP: SOPHIE HIGGINSON USING OUAI HAIR CARE AND NARS. STYLINGASSISTANT: PETER BEVANMaybe Im g
of the things I
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2
PHOTOGRAPHER:DA1
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