September sees the start of slipper season. Yet for some, slippers are their favoured footwear all year round. Meet the slipper super fans!
Slippers are shorthand for ‘permission to relax – you’re home’ says Catriona Innes, one of our favourite slipper fans, and features director of Cosmopolitan Magazine, published poet and author of The Matchmaker.
Catriona is so attached to what she calls our ‘champion slippers’ that she has been known to take them to festivals with her and wear them to her local kebab shop!
So, we asked Catriona to share her love of slippers in a new feature which celebrates the role slippers play in people’s lives. Catriona’s answers are honest, very funny, vulnerable and true.
Catriona, in her beloved slippers, at her local kebab shop
Do you wear slippers all year round?
It’s really, really rare you’ll see me at home without my sheepskin moccasin slippers on - summer or winter! Sometimes during a boiling hot summer day I will put them on and realise I’m being stupid as it’s too hot… But then I’ll feel slightly ‘foot naked’ throughout the day.
How important are slippers in your life?
They represent comfort and safety. Before discovering The Small Home, I’d buy really cheap slippers, so it felt quite a lot to invest in a pair. But wearing something day in day out that’s an investment reminds me that I’m a nice person who deserves nice things. I’ve packed and taken them along with me during some really tough times when I’ve been able to look down, and feel comforted by the sight of them on my feet. I guess they take me home.
A Scottish stroll... in slippers
Which is your favourite pair of slippers and why?
My very first pair! Which is the sheepskin Moccasin slipper, they’re SO tatty now and not as shiny as my other pairs, but I can’t bear to throw them away and occasionally will pop them on and feel happy! I posted about this pair on Instagram and as a result about twelve people purchased their own pair so my husband jokes that I am a slipfluencer! I am pleased to have been able to introduce others to them.
What do you love about slippers?
How sturdy they are! As all my pairs (I have mules and moccasins, am yet to try out the boot which is next on my list) have lasted so well, despite me wandering to the shops in them, taking them to festivals, camping and generally just treating them like shoes!
A quick jaunt to the collect a take-away... in slippers
What makes a really great pair of slippers?
Obviously, they have to be comfy and cosy, but they have to look lovely. Particularly over the last 18-months we’ve all been in our casual ‘home’ clothes so much. For me, I like to be comfy but not too slobby – I can’t relax if I’m in stained tee-shirts and holey joggers, I find it makes me feel really bad about myself. So, I’m all about wearing matching pyjamas, fresh joggers and slippers that you can absolutely chill out in but you still feel nice in.
Do you have any early slipper memories?
I used to have this most amazing pair that were like huge, shaggy sheep dogs! They were SO big, like Clown shoes and I tripped up in them all the time, but they made me so happy.
Do you have more than one pair of slippers?
I’ve kept every single pair I’ve bought, so have about four pairs now! But I tend to wear the most recently bought pair and wear the others if a slipper goes missing under the sofa or in bed!
Camping trip... in slippers
Tell us about some of the interesting places & times you have worn your slippers?
I packed them everywhere! This year I took them camping to a little yurt in Cornwall which was surrounded by amazing woods to explore. I kept finding myself wandering further and further away from the tent, cider in hand, before looking down and realising I was about to cross a stream - still in my slippers! They’re with me every time I go home to Scotland, I’ll be packing them for a festival later this month, but most crucially they came with me when I had to have a big operation last year. I was in those compression stockings, feeling utter rubbish, and I’d look down and feel reminded of home. It helped a lot.
Giving comfort in hospital
How would you describe the experience of putting their slippers on?
Permission to relax… you’re home!
Are you a slipper superfan?
Are you fanatical about slippers? Would others describe you as a ‘slipfluencer?’ If you’d like to share your love of slippers then get in touch via email at press@thesmallhome.co.uk or @thesmallhome using #thesmallhomeslippers.
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