Collector's Lecture: Chinese Lotus Shoes

For over a thousand years, successive generations of Chinese women endured the painful body modification of footbinding, when, as young girls, they suffered through a procedure in which their mothers systematically compressed and inhibited the natural growth of their feet, by binding them in constricting cotton bandages. The resultant aesthetically altered feet, -miniscule, tapering and pointed-were reputed to resemble the closed blossom of a water lily or lotus flower, and so given the appellation of “lily” or “lotus” feet.  Believed to be an enhancement, lotus feet were considered to be a highly valued attribute for a woman to possess, with the most coveted lotus foot, the absolute prized feminine adornment, determined to be an adult woman’s foot reduced to just three inches, or less, in length…..a “golden lotus.”

This personal collection acquired from numerous expeditions to China over a period of thirty-five years, began with an objective of rescuing, or…