For those of you who have ever met me in person, you’ll know that I am the least fashionable person out there. I take the ethos of reduce, reuse and recycle to heart when it comes to clothes; and prefer a rummage in a charity shop rather than a credit card binge on the highstreet. This serves three main purposes:

Firstly, I don’t contribute to the throwaway fashion economy, in which you can buy a whole outfit for less than the person who made it earns in a year. Secondly, and rather vainly, I don’t have to feel old and frumpy in the latest fashions; choosing instead to stick to my 90s grunge look which has served me well for the majority of my 20s. Lastly, and most lazily of all, I don’t have a clue when it comes to “ethical fashion” and prefer to hide away from having to actively research the rabbit warren which is the clothes and shoe industry.

If only Vivienne Westwood could come shopping around Truro with me, and help me find a bargainous green outfit which makes me feel 3 stone lighter. But alas! The trains getting down here are a bloody nightmare. But even the most clueless of us occasionally fall in love. And when I fall in love, I can become pretty wistful and dreamy. Meet the Amanda Blue – the most beautiful shoe I have seen in my life.

I am really and truly not a shoe person. I live in converse in the winter and flip flops in the summer; a simple and circular routine which has worked for years. But then walks in this bizzare and wonderful shoe/boot combination which gives me a whole new appreciation for footwear. So this is why women collect shoes and line them up in pretty rows in their bedrooms?!

So imagine my delight to discover that the people who made these shoes are a company called Bourgeois Boheme; who specialise in Vegan and ethical shoes! All their products are lovingly crafted without any animal-derived materials such as fur, leather, wool, silk and animal-based glues. There’s no PVC either. Instead, they choose high-quality, Italian-made cotton-backed microfibre PU (polyurethane), textiles and natural materials.

Everything from the design and materials, to the production and promotion is about creating quality, vegan friendly and ethical shoes – with a bit of cheeky twist. There’s no frumpy stereotypical vegan Dr martins going here (though you can’t beat a good pair of them either!)

So is my strange new obsession with a shoe fate telling me I should buy them and forget all my “make do and mend” convictions? Surely the chances of something I’ve previously been so indifferent to catching my eye AND it matching my ethics isn’t a coincidence? I’m not massively impulsive as a rule, but I was fully ready to whip out my card and treat myself to a pair of Amanda’s when I realised the price: £160!

I’m not sure I’ve ever spent more than £50 on an item of clothing…and that was reluctantly! Cue sad face and prolonged Goggling of my dream shoe in search of a second hand pair, with no such luck. I guess when you have a shoe like this you don’t give it up. Is this what heartbreak feels like?

Anyway, back to reality and I remind myself I’m lucky to have my converse and flip flops, when some people in the world might not ever have a pair of shoes at all. But a girl can dream I guess. Maybe if I offer to road test them as a follow up blog “When you’re united with your dream does the shoe fit?” the lovely team at Bourgeois Boheme might send me a complementary pair?