Wishing you a boot-iful time Northampton Museum and Art Gallery is home to one of the largest collections of shoes and shoe heritage in the world. The collection’s strength lies in its very broad range, from Ancient Egypt to the latest fashions, from workwear to high-end designer creations and from Northamptonshire-made shoes to footwear from around the world. But we don’t just collect shoes. The scope of the collection covers accessories including buckles and laces, shoehorns, shoe trees, spats and polish, shoemaking tools and machines, catalogues, trade journals and photographs and paintings and prints depicting shoes and shoemaking. This postcard shows a well-worn pair of boots which are not the most Christmassy of images, but perhaps because they are very well worn, they symbolise the wearer’s very essence, strength and luck, attributes that can be positively passed to others. So, the sender of this postcard is sending the recipient lots of luck, hope and strength for the future. Unfortunately, the card was never written on so sadly we don’t know who it was for.
Northampton Museums 