BEING A GIRL is being redefined before our eyes.
It’s one of the most exciting parts of parenting tomorrow’s women today.
Well, we think so, anyway.
The books are changing, the movies are changing, the toys are changing – even the clothes are (finally!) changing too. There is more of a choice of better role models (although look at the average teenagers’ Instagram feed and you might want to rage and/or cry!) but overall, we believe today’s young girls and women are redefining what BEING A GIRL means.
And at Vivobarefoot, we are proud to be a part of this.
We do not make shoes for girls and shoes for boys. We make shoes for awesome, wild barefoot KIDS!
ALL our shoes are created so kids’ feet can MOVE and FEEL almost barefoot, the best way for them to grow strong and healthy for balanced and skilful movement.
And for girls, this is still fairly revolutionary.
Just look at school shoes. Boys’ school shoes are about being rugged, tough and being able to run around. Girls’ get pretty, delicate, slippery and heeled.
Narrow, stiff shoes weaken the muscles and tendons, especially in the big toe, and if Big Toe is constantly tilted slightly up (from wearing shoes with even a very small heel) it becomes ‘lazy’, compromising its ability to grow straight and strong; pushing the whole body out of balance.
So it’s no great surprise to hear that by adulthood, women are FOUR TIMES as likely as men to have debilitating foot problems.
We ditched the stays, corsets and hoop skirts, right? Isn’t it about time we also stopped pushing, pinching and deforming women’s feet into painful conformity?
For women, the change is everywhere: gone are the days when you’d have to ‘sneak’ your trainers on to leave the office. Sneakers, trainers, sports shoes: whatever you call them, they go everywhere now. Even the mega high-end fashion brands all have (usually eye-wateringly expensive and pretty clunky) trainers. They might not be going sustainable and barefoot (yet!) but at least fashion is waking up to the fact that women might want to, well, MOVE.
We hope by the time today’s little girls are all grown up being able to move - run, walk, dance, skip and climb - every day, however and wherever they want.
After all, fashion should not be about controlling women’s freedom of movement.
