Weejuns
Weejuns
By the mid-1930s shoes handmade by Norwegian fishermen during their off-season became incredibly popular in Great Britain and the United States. These leather shoes featured slip-on styling, a moccasin toe, which was identified by the U-shaped leather inset stitched around the top of the shoe's front, and a strap sewn across the instep. The strap on Weejuns often had a diamond-shaped cutout in the center. These shoes came to be known as loafers in later decades. A variation on this moccasin-toe shoe was called the Norwegian-front shoe and featured laces over the instep. Weejuns were typically made in solid colors, but some styles were made of contrasting pieces of dark and light leather. These shoes became an important part of the fashionable preppy look of the 1950s and 1980s.
FOR MORE INFORMATION
Schoeffler, O. E., and William Gale. Esquire's Encyclopedia of 20th Century Men's Fashions. New York: McGraw-Hill, 1973.
[See also Volume 5, 1946–60: Preppy Look ]