WEARING WELL

Stories of the clothes we love CLOGS

“In clogs, all notion of balletic grace goes out the window”

The clothes that make us feel invincible are often the most unexpected. It’s not always a glitzy dress, or a smart suit with lapels so sharp they need their own risk assessment. Sometimes, it’s just your favourite jeans, a particularly soft sock, or, in my case, a pair of well-worn clogs.

I think it’s the clomping. In clogs, all notion of walking with balletic grace goes out the window, but it’s impossible to care when there’s feel-good confidence in every step. Purposeful strides, posture to rival Miss Jean Brodie’s, and a sense of security that can only come from having two hunks of wood strapped to your soles.

These surprisingly comfortable shoes have long offered protection to hard-working feet. And this is not just the stomping ground of the Dutch, of course, although their klompen are a design classic (and an official EUapproved safety shoe). Many countries have their own version, from the delightfully odd three-legged albarcas once worn by Cantabrian farmers in northern Spain to the leather-uppered English and Welsh clogs found in the mills and mines of old.

So they’re tough, that’s for sure. While it might be fanciful to believe that the word “sabotage” was inspired by our Belgian clog-wearing cousins jamming machinery with their wooden sabots during protests, the ferocious – and sometimes naked – clog fights of Northern English industrial towns were most definitely real. But happily, there’s always been a playfulness about clogs, too. Clog dancing was a popular pastime for mill workers during breaks, and spilled out into the Victorian music halls in a whirl of fancy footwork and a cacophony of clatters.

And it’s still a shoe that’s incredibly hard-wearing and fun. Personally, I tend to favour the Swedish ones, done so well by the likes of Lotta From Stockholm and Swedish Hasbeens. Buttery leather up top, clicketyclackety wood below, and the sort of nonchalant style that only comes from being Scandinavian by birth.

Mine wait by the back door to help me channel clog-wearers through the ages: the peaceful allotmenteer pottering among the marrows; the cool 70s aunt who owns an art gallery and claims to be the inspiration behind every vaguely risqué song of the decade; the 19th-century factory girl and part-time dancing queen, ready for another day of chin up, shoulders squared, I’ll-be-having-none-of-yournonsense-thank-you-very-much.

Who will I be today? I think I’ll let my clogs decide… noisily.