Diana’s Shoes: A Reflection of Her Life and Style

From court shoes to cone heels, evening pumps to slip-ons and loafers, Princess Diana's collection of shoes was extensive.

Her shoe choices traced all the ups and downs of her life, especially when it came to her romance with Charles.

As designer Bruce Oldfield put it, “it's all there.”

Her changing styles also mirror the rise of the shoe designer in fashion.

In her early royal years, Diana ordered pair after pair of low-heeled court shoes in a rainbow of colors to match every conceivable outfit.

She was careful never to overstep the heel height mark, ordering heels at 2 inches only, no higher than that.

They were pointed, with a V-cut, and became what she called her regular shoe.

Her shoe size, incidentally, is thought to have been 6 1⁄2.

Only gradually did the hemlines go up, the skirts narrow and the heels start to rise.

In the last two years of her life, her marriage behind her, she entered her super-groomed phase of elegant, strappy slingbacks.

There were no tights, just tan legs, and she was long past caring about giving the impression of being shorter.

She laughed when Jimmy Choo warned that a pair of 4-inch evening heels might be difficult to move in.

“‘I won't be going out walking here and there,' she said.

“‘I want to be taller than the men.'”

Breaking the bare leg taboo, Diana was the first royal to go without tights in public, let alone a member of the royal family.

Her off-duty habit wasn't much remarked on, but by 1991, as her hemlines rose, it became obvious Diana was daring to bare her legs on official occasions as well.

By the late 90s, save for the times she wore tandem-ear black tights, her bare legs and dresses well above the knee were just part of the progressive style she'd made her own.

If there's one thing every woman knows about dressing for weddings, christenings, and family parties, it's the n^de shoe rule.

Diana pioneered the look 14 years earlier.

In 1997, she'd already hit on the trick of enhancing her one-colored shift dresses with pale beige shoes, thereby visually lengthening her legs.

Her shoes were by designers such as Jimmy Choo, Gina, and Versace, where Diana led, the Duchess of Cornwall, Duchess of Cambridge, and even the Queen, on occasion, have followed her lifelong love of Jimmy Choo.

Diana discovered Jimmy Choo through the designer Tomusz Starzywski, who took him to Kensington Palace when she needed shoes to match her dresses.

Choo's special talent was making shoes quickly by hand – he says he lost count of how many he made for Diana.

He became her footwear equivalent of Catherine Walker, someone she trusted to craft things exactly as she wanted.

Sleek, glamorous, and increasingly s**y as time went on, she said, “keep it simple.”

He remembered how she rejected all his ideas about adding crystals and pearls, or running around during the day, she wanted his comfortable, flat pumps with a V-cut in front.

Flats for the young Diana were necessary to prevent her from towering over her new husband.

Later in life, when she wasn't wearing slinky heels, Diana still adhered to the classic Sloane casual shoe code.

Even her favorite mid-80s cowboy boots were her personal interpretation of a Sloaney trend much in evidence on the King's Road at the time.

Mainly, though, her default look drew on the upper-class preference for Gucci loafers and conventional Ferragamo patent pumps with broad, Peter Chambeau's on the toes.

Diana's shoes are a reflection of her life and style.

They tell the story of a young girl thrust into the spotlight, struggling to find her way in a new world.

They also show the transformation of a woman who no longer had any doubts about emphasizing her statuesque 5ft 10in height.

Her shoes were an extension of her personality, and she used them to express herself.

Her fashion-forward choices have influenced women's footwear for decades, and her legacy lives on through her iconic shoe collection.