Shoes. Pair of light blue booties for “lily” (bound) feet. Uppers pale blue satin with flower pattern embroidered at tip. Front seam secured there with crimson-braid tack, then with cord covered by a black web. Front of uppers ivory satin in an almost horseshoe-shaped maize satin border. This border edged below in a black tape or material outside a narrower red tape stitched on with white thread. Top edge of horseshoe edged in narrow dusty pink tape, again stitched on with white thread; and a somewhat wider strip of dark purple material. Maize satin embroidered with two bats and a flower. An 8 cm-wide tab rises from the heel for putting on the bootie. Red and pale blue cotton, rectangular. Function of white cotton loops unknown. Uppers lined with white cotton cloth. Sharply pointed upper sole covered with pink fabric inside. Heel end piped mauve, further forward with the cross-section of a green, pink and blue ribbon; tip white. Second sole, 1.5 cm thick at the heel, covered with white cotton fabric and stitched to the upper one. The cut-off tip decorated with a flap like the end of a necktie: bias-striped blue and silver material edged at the chevron with a green, white, and lavender tape with inwoven black lozenges. Tapering strips of green, light brown, light grey, and forest green material cover the center. The navy-blue-piped white heel is glued and stitched to this sole. Overall length of bootie: 12.5 cm; width of upper sole: 5 cm.
Donor:
Ilse Martin Fang
Collection place:
Peking, Beijing province, China
Verbatim coll. place:
China. Purchased by Ilse Fang in Peking flea market.
Culture or time period:
Manchu people and Qing dynasty (1644–1912 AD)
Collector:
Ilse Martin Fang
Collection date:
1945
Materials:
Cotton (textile) and Satin
Object type:
ethnography
Object class:
Embroidery (visual works) and Shoes (footwear)
Function:
2.4 Fine Clothes and Accoutrements not used exclusively for status or religious purposes