The Boot and Shoe Trades in London and Paris in the Long Eighteenth Century

These are the theoretical reasons that motivate research into this particular
subject. My hope is that this research can show that behind the staid image of a
traditional trade many salient factors can be identified. One of the elements that
surprised me when starting was the contrast between the pre-industrial boot and
shoe trade and the twentieth-century footwear industry. While the boot and shoe
trade of the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries was a traditional craft production,
the footwear production of the twentieth century seems to have experienced
epochal changes. In the last quarter of the twentieth century the invention of
trainers, in particular, has completely changed production, distribution, advertising
and the social and cultural meanings associated with the consumption of shoes.'
Technology and research & development are new elements in the footwear
industry. There seems to be almost an inexplicable difference between the
uninteresting shoemaking production of the eighteenth and early nineteenth
centuries and the high complexity of the present day product. Did something
change or is it simply a problem of historical knowledge? In both cases the
possible answers seem to bear a great deal of interest.2
2. Historiography
The first step in my research was to survey the literature available. The boot and
shoe trade is more neglected than one can imagine. The quantity of company
histories and manuals on how to make a pair of shoes is overwhelming compared
to the historical studies on the trade. My secondary sources are not only limited in
amount but also in quality. There are few good exceptions: Dorothy George wrote
a few pages full of interest on the boot and shoe trade in London during the
The 'rise of the trainers' has imposed a new identity for shoes. The producer guarantees through
a logo the quality and fashion of the shoe. Vice-versa, the size label normally on the sole of shoes,
in trainers is inside. The high rate of obsolescence of the product has induced the producer to put a
label with the year and month of production.
2 The interest displayed in twentieth-century footwear stems from a large quantity of popular
publications on various aspects of shoe design, fashion and entrepreneurial success. For instance: S.
Ferragamo, Shoemaker of Dreams. The autobiography of Salvatore Ferragamo (London, 1957); T.
J. Bata and S. Sinclair, Bata shoemaker to the world (Toronto, 1990).
2