Slouchy Socks in Heels

I've always loved wearing skirts with socks in unexpected shoes. 

To personalize our boarding school uniforms, we wore slouchy blue socks over our navy tights and tunic until the headmaster passed a decree forbidding that particular self-expression.

In graduate school, I went full-on grunge via long, romantic floral dresses and gray woolen socks stuffed into my Doc Martens.

And as an undergraduate, I inherited my grandmother's absolutely gorgeous Bandolino shoes, with which I wore skinny, slouchy black socks with long lean black column dresses.

This was the mid 1980s, and how can I express the joy these shoes gave to a teenager who was famished for style, having grown up on a tiny island. The shoes were patent navy, with a low heel and deep V vamp. The vamp was made out of a basketweave in red, yellow, and navy leather, which truly was lovely and unusual for the time and place. 

My column dress was actually an ankle-length jersey jumper, also with a deep V neck (reaching almost to the waist), which I wore backwards. Continuing the backwards theme, I topped it off with a vintage red, bracelet sleeve, raw silk collarless top with covered buttons on the back that I turned around and wore as a jacket.

I'd wear this out at the clubs till 2 (in Quebec!) and all day besides.

Looking at the photographs in this month's Porter magazine (a lovely publication, by the way), I was struck by an editorial that featured slouchy socks in heels. These socks are Hermes, and I could either buy them or three pairs of Doc Martens, but truly, Hermes is not required for this look; indeed, it will fly with a sock that's more grounded in price.