A modern tech enterprise specializing in footwear and protective materials
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2026
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The Development History of Shoe Culture
About 5000 years ago, during the Yangshao culture period, the most primitive shoes made of animal skins appeared.
About 5000 years ago, during the Yangshao culture period, the most primitive shoes made of animal skins appeared. Boots and shoe uppers appeared in the Neolithic Age. During the Xia Dynasty, the techniques of "assisting with bottom splitting" and "reverse mounting" emerged. The Shang Dynasty saw the emergence of leather shank armor and "leather shoes". The Zhou Dynasty saw the emergence of loafers, clogs, and copper foam nail boots. The character 'shoe' representing shoes appeared in the Book of Changes written over 3000 years ago. During the Warring States period, Sun Bin was unable to walk due to his knee bone being broken by Pang Juan. He used hard leather to cut into "soles" and "uppers" and invented the high leather Xuan, which later became boots. In the Qin Dynasty, there was a munitions shoe factory and a unified shoe making standard. The Terra Cotta Warriors soles of the Qin Dynasty have seen the thread technology.
During the Northern Qi Dynasty, clogs became a fashion trend. They were shoes with wooden teeth, consisting of three parts: flat, tied, and toothed. In addition, during the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, there was also a production of gilded copper nail clogs woven into shoes and decorated with luxury. During the Tang Dynasty, leather boots became popular and shoe size standards began to emerge. Leather shoes were also widely popular in the Song Dynasty. Men often wore small headed leather shoes, while women had round, flat or upturned heads, decorated with various flower and bird patterns. The trend of foot binding began in the Five Dynasties period. By the Song Dynasty, the trend of women binding their feet was popular, and the aesthetic of "three inch golden lotus" was widely popularized, leading to the emergence of high headed arched shoes.
Women's cloth shoes with high toe and flat and thick sole began to appear in the late Yuan Dynasty. During the Liao, Jin, Western Xia, and Yuan dynasties, boots became popular again. In the Ming and Qing dynasties, the production methods and styles of shoes gradually merged and became more refined. During the Ming Dynasty, shoes were mainly thick and sturdy, with diamond patterned shoes commonly worn in the north and brown linen shoes in the south. In the Ming Dynasty, double beam shoes also appeared. In the Qing Dynasty, it was popular for banner women to wear flowerpot soled shoes (also known as horseshoe soled shoes). The Qing Dynasty stipulated that civilians were not allowed to wear boots, and boots became a symbol of official rank. In the late Qing Dynasty, Western style leather shoes were introduced to China and gradually became popular.
During the Republic of China period, the footwear market was extremely prosperous, with westernized styles and the emergence of high-heeled leather shoes, rubber shoes, and so on. In the late 1970s to early 1990s, China's footwear industry transitioned from traditional manual labor to semi mechanization. In contemporary times, shoe design places more emphasis on integrating traditional culture (such as Song Yun) into innovative design and creating cultural brands.
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