[Explanation] Leather shoes, rain boots, cloth shoes, and felt shoes. In a collection room in Jinyuan District, Taiyuan City, Shanxi Province, nearly a thousand pairs of "three-inch embroidered shoes" collected by Zhao Shixin are placed.
Because he was curious about the "three-inch golden lotus" as a child, Zhao Shixin began to collect three-inch embroidered shoes. In more than 40 years, he has collected more than 4,000 pieces related to the "three-inch golden lotus", including embroidered shoes, old photos, clothing, etc.
[Concurrent] Zhao Shixin
The reason for the collection is that when I was young, when I was ignorant, I saw that my grandma had small feet, so I wanted to look at her feet. But I also saw that the other old people in the village also had small feet, chasing them to see the small feet, and watching them walk, I was curious. We must find a way to figure this out when we grow up.
[Explanation] Three-inch embroidered shoes, also called bow shoes, are shoes worn by women with foot-binding in ancient times. They are named after their soles bend up like a bow. Among all the women's shoes in Zhao Shixin's collection, bow shoes account for up to 80%, and the rest are foot shoes and sky shoes that appeared in modern times.
[Concurrent] Zhao Shixin
It was in Nangong, Taiyuan Nangong Market in 1979. I was very excited when I came across a pair of small shoes. They asked for 15 yuan at the time, so they would be happy if they just picked it up. That pair of shoes is the beginning of my collection of small shoes.
[Explanation] The three-inch embroidered shoes collected by Zhao Shixin are very different in materials, styles, and uses. There are even stone, wood, porcelain, and silver jewelry shoes about 1 to 3 cm in length.
[Concurrent] Zhao Shixin
In terms of materials, there are leather shoes, rain boots, cloth shoes, embroidered shoes, filial shoes, felt shoes, straw shoes and so on. In terms of shoe specifications, there are three-inch golden lotus, Jiefang shoes and Tianjiao shoes. In terms of styling, there are flat shoes, bow-soled shoes, as well as high-heeled shoes and shoes with heels.
[Explanation] Set off against each other with women's shoes are old photos on the booth. There are more than 1,000 pictures and portraits. The women among them all wear small foot shoes, showing distinctive characteristics of the times.
[Concurrent] Zhao Shixin
So far, little-footed women are basically no longer alive, so how can children in the future see this extraordinary history? Only through physical objects, so only physical objects can present history.
Editor in charge: [Ji Xiang]