If the shoe fits… - ballet shoes

Dance Magazine, June, 1995 by Marian Horosko

Your pointe shoes may be beautiful. Strong. Light. Expensive. Imported. But do they fit properly? Correctly chosen, pointe shoes can be a joy to wear. Ill-fitting, they can be a detriment and a costly mistake.. With more styles available than ever before, choosing a pointe shoe may require expert advice.

Joe Kaplan, vice-president of sales and marketing for La Mendola, manufacturers of dance and gymnastic footwear, has been lecturing on the correct fitting of dance shoes for more than twenty years. Here are some of his suggestions to help you choose a comfortable and suitable pointe shoe that will keep your feet healthy and happy.

FIRST SHOES

Although research material is available for almost anything you buy for the first time, little is available for the first purchase of pointe shoes. The buyer has to rely on the salesperson, who may have had little experience in fitting pointe shoes, or the advice of a teacher, who is not present at the time of the purchase.

According to Kaplan, "Fitting the first shoe requires that the salesperson know from experience how to evaluate the feet nature has given the student; be able to determine if the student is in a growth pattern; and be able to see, almost at a glance, how much training the student has had for pointe work." A tall order.

A knowledgeable salesperson's biggest obstacle in finding a good fit is the parent who insists that the shoe be a little wider to accommodate the child's quick growth. "It's dangerous," says Kaplan, "to wear a shoe so wide that it moves when the child tries the shoe on the floor. Never, never, never permit a child to wear a shoe with more width than necessary. In ballet shoes, the toes may wiggle a bit, but not in pointe shoes. If the toes look bumpy, however, the shoes are too tight. As for length, no more than 1/4 inch should be allowed for the growing foot."

When the shoe fits properly, it gives gentle support but does not prop up the foot; nor does it hang off the heel. Whatever the shape of the leg from knee to toes - straight or curved - those two points must be in a straight line when standing on pointe. The toes should neither be pressed too far forward nor too far back. Standing correctly on pointe is the objective of pointe work. It's not a question of finding a shoe that will make corrections or hide faults.

Kaplan makes no allowances for padding stuffed into the shoe - lamb's wool, toe pads, linen, heel grips, or socks. "You're not fitting the shoe," he says. "You're fitting whatever you stuffed into it. Feet will toughen up. If you pad to avoid friction, the shoe has not been properly fitted and the foot cannot work through the pleats." Moleskin padding between the toes, however, does not interfere with the expansion of the pleats on the bottom of the shoe or constrict the foot as the dancer rises through demi-pointe to pointe. The child should not only stand on pointe during the fitting, but also in Fifth Position, and should do some releves to discover gaps or movement in the vamp. The final choice should be a lightweight and flexible shoe to continue the strengthening of the feet as only pointe work can do. The student should feel the complete stretch of the entire foot and leg as the weight of the body is lifted upwards and away from the hips and legs over the toes. Clenching the toes to hold the foot stable is the result of an inflexible shoe and should be avoided by everyone. A softer and narrower box is required.

Don't sew the ribbons on the shoes until the teacher approves of the shoe. And be sure that the salesperson writes on the sales slip that the shoe was slightly larger than necessary, if that was the case, to provide a useful record for the next fitting.

NEW SHOES

Time and circumstances make changes in the feet. Let us assume that you were perfectly happy with your pointe shoes in the past but now find them uncomfortable. Inspect your old shoes. Have the pleats unfolded, pulled out from the shank, or split anywhere on the shoe? Some manufacturers cut the satin so short there is insufficient seam inside the shoe. Satin of poor quality will stretch and split. Just plain wear will show at the big toe, on the pleats, and heel.

The Box: the hardened section covering the toes.

Did you need to beat that box to a pulp when the shoe was new? Did you soak it in alcohol? Squash it in a doorway?

"There are shoes sold today," says Kaplan, "that would not have passed over the counter years ago." The best shoes still have handmade boxes that are softer or harder to order. Some manufacturers, however, use preformed plastic boxes that do not permit the dancer to rise through 1/4, 1/2, or 3/4 pointe until the final spring to the tip because of the rigidity of the box. The satin outside and buckram or burlap inside of the box, cut to size, with the drawstring in its machine-stitched casing that circles the top of the shoe, should be glued together with a rye-flour-and-water formula. After the marking, measuring, cutting and stitching have been done by others, the shoemaker matches the upper to a form and the shank, and then pleats. He pushes and pulls with various instruments as he remolds the still-soft block of glue and burlap into its square, long, flat, oval, or curved shape. The box is then oven-dried overnight to preserve the shape. In some cases inferior materials and glue are used, so that the shoe does not wear well. There are manufacturers who insert pads into the box, as in sneakers; it comforts the foot but spoils the fit.