1940s Platforms: A Little History

We now have two gorgeous 1940s platform peep-toe styles available in our line, since our See and be Seen collection was launched for pre-order. The new Stella Slingbacks, in addition to our existing Ava Platforms, are reproductions of the high-heeled platform styles that were ever-so-popular in the 1940s.

The 1940s were a decade of dualities in fashion. World War II had a major influence on fashion, in addition to, well, everything else. Early 1940s fashion was largely about practicality and function, and this includes footwear. As we’ve discussed in some previous posts on the blog, materials rationing during the war (especially in Europe) led designers experimenting with different materials and creative designs. Cork and wood could be used to create platforms and wedges, for example. Platform shoes could even be a sign of resistance. In Nazi-occupied France, a high platform shoe could be a sartorial act of defiance against restrictive clothing regulations and conservatism.

These French platforms from the early 1940s are a great example of wartime ingenuity. Since leather was unavailable, the uppers are made of raffia and the sole/heels from wood. From the collection at the Bata Shoe Museum.

The end of the war in 1945 signified a turn in fashion trends. Designers began to steer away from austerity in favor of femininity, casualwear, and sportswear. Cultural optimism and a renewed appetite for glamour led to fashion trends that embraced bold aesthetics. The novelty of a high-heel with a platform matched this idea perfectly. In addition to being attention-grabbing and seductive, they offered designers an opportunity to play up decorative features and to create innovative designs.

Decorative 1940s painted platforms, from the collection at the Shoe Icons museum.

Seymour Troy platform slingbacks, from the collection at the Met Museum.

This is an expression we recognize…there’s nothing like finding the perfect shoe!

Hollywood and popular culture played a role in the popularity of platforms too. Carmen Miranda might be the most famous platform shoe enthusiast from the time. She was an early platform ‘influencer’ of sorts. Since she was only 5 feet tall, she wore decorative, sky-high heeled shoes (often made by Ferragamo, by the way) with tall platforms to give her a boost of height. Her wide variety of glamorous shoes added to her status as a fashion icon. She even left an imprint of her high-heeled platform shoes alongside her handprints in the cement at Grauman’s Theater in Los Angeles.

Carmen Miranda’s handprints and shoeprints at Grauman’s

Carmen Miranda with some of her many pairs of platforms.

Carmen Miranda’s usage of platforms to give her some extra height actually points out a practical feature of this kind of shoe; since the platform under the toe raises the ball of the foot, the grade of the foot is less severe than if one were wearing a 4.5″ heel with no platform underneath. So you could have both comfort and glamour all at the same time!

The popularity of platforms persisted through the 1940s in daywear and eveningwear, with strappy sandals, peep-toes, and spectators. It wasn’t until Dior’s ‘New Look’ (which debuted in 1947) became ubiquitous in womenswear at the end of the 1940s when platforms began to decline in popularity. Today, the sort of platform heels that we based Stella off of remain iconographic of the 1940s.