Interview: The Shoe Girl Pt.1

Ok, so to celebrate 200 days of shoes yesterday (woopee) on The Shoe Girl Diaries, there will be an interview all week, with The Shoe Girl aka, me, Pink Haired Princess. Some of you sent in questions a little while ago and I mentioned a surprise goodie bag (winning question picked at random), so more on that later in the week. Picture-free questions first, but I have some great photos for later in the week, let's begin....

Have you always been known as 'The Shoe Girl'?
Pretty much so. Everyone always knew me as 'that girl with the crazy shoes' at school and around where I live and they'd always look to see which shoes I was wearing. Then at a house party at Uni, this boy told me that all his friends called me "the shoe girl" when they didn't know my name and that was the first time someone actually admitted to it and it stuck, haha! I thought it was the perfect name for the blog.

What was your motivation or reasons for starting the blog?
There were lots of reasons. I've been ill for almost 8 years now and blogging in general was something I could manage at home that still kept me creative and involved in fashion and beauty-which is what I love and I really missed being a"part" of that. I also don't get out all that much and thought it would be nice to know that somebody other than my Mum or nosey neighbour would see the special shoes I was wearing that day! I already started Pink Haired Princess and didn't know exactly how I would go about this shoe blog, what would the rules be, how would it work? Then it was while reading WhatKatieWore one day that I thought "I could do a variation of that, but with shoes". I wanted to get myself to wear those styles that I'd fallen out of love with instead of the latest shoe that I would wear over and over again. I also wanted to help people that buy online, because seeing a shoe on the foot can completely change your opinion of it. I try to write about whether the shoe is comfortable to wear, whether you need to go a size up etc

You must work in a very relaxed setting, that would allow you to wear such outrageous colours and heels.
Well, I don't work due to health reasons, so I can have pink hair and bright yellow platform shoes and nobody cares : ) In the past though, I've always pushed it as far as I could, even at school with the shoes or clothes I wore-I don't like having to conform when it comes to fashion!

What size of shoe do you wear?
A UK 5/38. It used to be you could buy me any pair of size 5's, from any brand without me trying them on and they'd fit. However as I've put on weight in recent years I do struggle sometimes with strapping across the foot or around the ankle or very narrow styles.

Would you ever consider doing daily outfit posts? If your clothes are anything like your shoes, I'd love to see that!
Haha, thank you! Well as I've mentioned I've put on weight in recent years and I'm just getting used to being that much bigger and although I'm confident enough, I don't think I'm at the stage where I would feel comfortable doing that. The other more important reason is that I actually haven't figured out how to get a decent full length shot, taking the photo by myself-it's pretty impossible actually. Plus I wanted this blog to be something different, there are tonnes of daily outfit blogs out there and although quite a few people are now taking inspiration from me by setting themselves the challenge to wear different shoes every day-it was original at the time.

Who takes the images for the blog and where are they taken?
I take the photos myself. Once I figured out that I could take a decent enough shot of my own feet, I realised the blog was possible. I sometimes find myself in strange positions twisting and bending to get that decent image. Most images are taken in my bedroom (the pale green carpet) or around the house. I would feel very weird with someone else taking my photo or doing it in public! Maybe if I could sneakily take the image outdoors without anyone seeing, then I would. I should probably challenge myself to do that!

How can you afford so many shoes? You must be rich!
Haha, no I must be broke-from all the shoe buying! Ok, I don't want to get too serious or personal here but I have no "real" responsibilities; I don't have children to look after or massive bills to pay etc etc. So the majority of my money is spent on shoes/clothes/beauty. I don't go out, I don't drink or smoke, so I have no outgoings there. Also this shoe collection isn't an instant thing. I've been collecting since I was a teenager when my £10 a week paper-round money would be saved for shoe buying!

Has this blog had an effect on the size of your shoe collection?
Yes it has, but maybe not as you'd expect. Maybe a third of the shoes I've worn, I've now parted with. I'm a terrible hoarder, but wearing or seeing these shoes, I realised I no longer liked them or needed them, so off they went. Between giving to charity, selling on ebay or binning, I've probably given at least 100 pairs in the last 18 months. That may seem like I'm really wasteful, but I enjoyed the shoes at the time and now I'd say my thinking has changed that I try to only buy really unusual shoes rather than some ok-ish ones because they're only £12!

Did you ever know how many pairs of shoes you owned?
I used to always say "more than 100, less than 200". I have of course been proven wrong by that, seeing as I've reached 200 and am still going strong! There's also been several pairs recently that I've given away without photographing for the blog (maybe another 20 pairs). I had no idea I had this many though, honestly.

Interview Part 2, coming soon!