Day2Night Convertible Heels by Candice Cabe | www.convertible-heels.com | email@candicecabe.com

Problem:
Women love to wear high heel shoes because they allow them to appear taller & look great, however after just a few hours women's feet start to hurt! Related problems: women have to carry extra shoes in their purse, bridesmaids need the same shoe in multiple heel heights, the nail on the bottom of shoes wears off in as little as 4 days & going to the cobblers is expensive and time consuming, women with a leg length inequality (LLI) cannot put orthopedic inserts inside high heel shoes or open toed shoes!
Solution:
A convertible shoe that goes from 3 1/2" down to 1 1/2" with 5 different sized completely removable heels will alleviate these pain points. Same shoe w/ different heights & ability for those w/ LLI to put a taller heel on one foot. The front of the sole must be flexible enough to accommodate the adjustment in height. An open toed strappy evening shoe is easier to produce so that the fabric doesn't get bunched up. It has to look elegant from the consumer's eye when shopping & wearing them, with no visible locking/ clipping mechanisms. It should be easy to remove and put on (no tools necessary).
Challenges:
1) Toe Pitch: When the height is brought down from a high heel, there is “toe pitch” – the toe pitches upward. A flexible sole will alleviate this, but typically soles in high heels are not flexible at all- this will need to be created.
2) Metal Shank: All high heels have a rigid metal or plastic shank that runs from the center of the heel of the foot to the center of the ball of the foot. This is there so the shoe does not collapse when in the high postion and it supports the weight of the person wearing them. I believe we will have to “cheat” a bit from traditional shoe making and cut our shank back by a ½” to an 1” in order to make the forefront flexible enough. There’s a possibility of creating some sort of adjustable shank that changes as the shoe goes down, but this is complicated and remember everything must look really elegant and one shouldn’t be able to tell that this is a convertible heel from even 1 foot away.
3) Heel Design: If you take a high heel and simply saw it off in ½” increments – you’ll notice that the heel looks weird as you get lower and lower. The heel starts to pitch forward, it looks unbalanced, and with the weight / force is now in a different spot and the heel is likely to break. Taking the entire heel off can be done, but it doesn’ t look as elegant as just taking the bottom section off.
4) If just the bottom comes off, we need a way to mask the cut line so you can’t notice it from a short distance ( a foot away).
5) Competition: www.camileonheels.com is the only company that you can buy convertible shoes from. Their heel looks weird b/c you can see the cut line of wear the bottom half comes off- it looks funny when it’s in the collapsed (down position).
6) The heel should come all the way off, not just collapse or pivot inwards.