Riding Boots And Fashion
As testimonies to an age old occupation which is still fashionable, horse riding boots have a history of their own to tell. Riding footwear has been first developed for men and an entire masculine hierarchy was mirrored by these items of mens wear.
Commoners had horses as working aids, and would rarely use those to ride. Noblemen however needed riding boots to show their superior social status clearly, while still needing them to be flexible, tall, thick and insulating. The pleasure or parade riders from noblemens courts wore different boots when they were hunting or waging war.
The traditional material of which such footwear was made from was leather. Hunting took riders through dust and thorny bushes and sometimes into swamps. Hunting for food, not for pleasure, meant having to ride for long hours through difficult circumstances and in all seasons. Such footwear has become significantly taller than the knee, and laced at the back of the feet. If the boot itself was shorter, it was worn with chaps and gaiters.
Warfare used to be another activity in close connection to riding. Army riders were noblemen mostly, and their boots were a question of status as well. But wars meant having to ride at various paces with little other things to do sometimes for months. Cavalry forces had to wear uniforms, which meant that special footwear which was at the same time classy and universally easy to wear needed to be designed. The rounded or moderately sharp front design suits most kinds of toe shapes and the more or less precious finishing of the leather involved, as well as the best or less good quality leather used was made to do the rest.
So, although being a typical mens wear item that has gradually translated into the female world afterward, riding boots have always been an object of rigorous functionality standards and social concepts easy to be afterward translated in fashion. Alongside its rather stern look, fashion designers who have been attracted to this challenging footwear have added a lot of subtle elegance to it. Ladies riding boots should not at all be expected to be unisex and the exquisitely different lines of boots that top online specialized stores like BP Country supply are the best proof to that. You must remember that in the last two decades riding boots have in their turn influenced urban fashion design and browsing such collections will have you understand why.