Sexy Thigh High Boots

My first recollection of thigh high boots was in a shoe shop named Shelly's in London's Oxford Street when I was a kid. I always found those boots quite curious because the way the shop was laid out, you had to go into the basement for women's footwear and against the walls were shoe racks around 6 foot high. The thigh high boots were always on the very top shelves out of reach. This was surely down to the fact that they take up much more space than any other kind of footwear, but looking back, it does conjure up a naughtiness about them. Top shelf shoes, avert eyes, don't look!

That says it all about thigh high boots really, they deserve their place on the top shelf.

Aside from subsequent visits to Shelly's, my next encounter with thigh high boots was in the film Pretty Woman. That opening sequence when Julia Roberts is getting ready and covers the scuffs on her boots with black marker pen. That's the first time I realised that thigh high boots were sexy, covered in marker pen or not.

Aside from those visits to Shelly's shoe shop, I had never really seen thigh high boots being sold. Probably due to the fact that they weren't in fashion and still really considered to be hooker attire (Just for the record, Shelly's which is no longer there, was in Soho in London. Soho is somewhat adult in nature, and that's why they sold them.). During one of my regular trips over the France to stock up on fine wines and gourmet foods for half the price of here, I went out of my usual routine and visited a shopping mall. It was there that I saw, fell in love with, and purchased a pair of killer stiletto thigh high boots.

They were the only pair of thigh high boots in the shop and I did get some rather strange looks when I was trying them on. I seem to remember sitting next to a man who was with a woman who was looking at shoes, and when I started to zip up from ankle to thigh she said something to him (my French is somewhat lacking since leaving school) and motioned him to move. He did.

I never thought of them as anything else than a beautifully made pair of black leather thigh high boots. They looked stunning on. That is until a friend and I were planning a night out. We were going to a gig of one of the bands I worked with. This particular friend was sensible, she was straight laced, and most of all to my annoyance, she would always wear comfortable shoes! Something I had no concept of back then. It was a very unusual night out if she didn't end up with my killer heels in her bag for the latter part of the evening and me going home barefoot carrying them.

When planning this night out, I happened to say to her, I hope you're bringing a big bag! To which she asked why. So I told her "because I'm wearing my thigh high boots".

"I'm not going out with you in them, you'll like like a prostitute" she said over the phone.

Now I had always known that this friend was very on the vanilla side, but I couldn't believe my ears! And she wasn't joking, she was serious. I told her she was being ridiculous and that just because I didn't follow fashion, didn't mean that wearing thigh high boots would make me look like a lady of the night.

I was quite wrong.

She ended up canceling on me that night. She claimed it was for some reason other than the boots, but I knew it wasn't. I did wear the boots that night, just under a long dress, so the effect was lost, but I knew I was wearing them and you could clearly see the killer stiletto heel. Certainly, no one offered me any money in exchange for some adult action. Pfft to my prudish friend.

The next time I wore them was a different story altogether. It was outside London in a place called Hull. No offense to anyone from the place, but it's not exactly cosmopolitan to say the least. Anyway, I'm a bit more risque this time, I decide that I want to show off these pieces of design mastery in all their thigh high glory, so I wear a much shorter dress. Black, flowing, not tight in the least, and it skimmed the top of my boots barely showing any skin, and only when I walked.

It was another gig, and when I walked into the venue, people, mainly men, looked at me, looked away, then looked back at me from feet to head and mouths dropped. I certainly wasn't looking for the attention, but I definitely got it.

I was there with a group of guys, so no one said anything, yet I can't help feeling that if I had been with girls, things could have got a bit awkward. Did they think I was a hooker? I have no idea, but one thing I did pick up on is the fact that most men looked plain scared of me. Again, had I been with a bunch of girls it may have been a different story.

Today thigh high boots are the celebrity footwear of choice, in flat or heeled styles. though Victoria Beckham is leading the fashion pack in wearing them, I'd say it was actually Lady GaGa who made them popular. So now it's acceptable to wear thigh high boots, it's actually the height of fashion to do so!

Have the fashionistas reported that the thigh high celebrities resemble hookers? Not a chance, they're all out buying the same footwear!

I was a thigh high pioneer and I'm damn proud of it! I bet my prudish friend wouldn't have a problem being seen with me in my stiletto thigh highs these days, not now that they are the height of the footwear fashion world.