The Closet Thinker: sweet and low down

I'm not sure whether it is the demure Middleton effect, but very high heels don't look quite right anymore.

Of course, this isn't an overnight revelation - these changes are so slow as to be almost imperceptible for a while, but the shift is undeniable. Or at least that's how it seems to me right now as I window-shop in search of the Right Shoes. True, there is still a plenitude of vertiginous stilettos, many likely to be displayed on those of the limousine classes at London Fashion Week. But a legion of hard-working journalists will be wearing flats or lower heels to the shows, in part for reasons of practicality (they'll be late if they can't run), and also because fashion's pendulum always swings back from extreme variations.

Just as the excess of heavyweight it-bags is unsightly in the current economy, so too are overly vulgar shoes; though in retrospect, the question of shoe height was already decided by last year's Royal Wedding, when the pregnant Victoria Beckham tottering in hooker heels suggested an off-kilter message. (Not because expectant mothers should be consigned to purdah and matronly brogues - if the shoe fits, then wear it, if you so wish - but ridiculous stilettos are wrong, wrong, wrong in Westminster Abbey.) As a fashion editor friend of mine commented, 'You can't imagine Carole Middleton putting a step out of place in inappropriate heels, nor her daughters.'

Snootier commentators might add that such a sensible approach is evidence of Mrs Middleton's former career as a flight attendant - and it's true, air-hostesses are mostly too wise to force their feet into punishingly high heels - but this isn't only a matter of practicality. Consider Audrey Hepburn in Breakfast at Tiffany's ; she strolls through Manhattan in sublimely subtle Givenchy dresses and matching little black heels. The closest match I've ever found were by Emma Hope, several years ago - sadly not in the current range - but Asos has not dissimilar Slipper Vamp kitten heels for ￡35; and at the other end of the price scale I like Rupert Sanderson's Claret patent peep-toe pumps (in black or orchid suede).

Sanderson himself confesses to an aversion to the term mid-heel. 'It sounds frumpy, you have to avoid those dreaded words - what about demi-heel instead?' But aside from details of phraseology, he admires 'the cool, very refreshing look of a lower heel - less is more'. To which I can only add that neither Cinderella nor Holly Golightly would wear elephantine platforms to the ball, consigning them to the realm of pantomime dames…