I have always been passionate about shoes. I remember the red Keds I was wearing when I learned to tie my shoelaces and the first shoes with a heel that I was able to talk my mother into buying. They were black patent with a chunky heel and a gold snake ornament. I cried when the soles became scuffed and they were no longer perfect.

I also come from a family of women who have ruined their feet by wearing ill-fitting shoes.

Determined to prevent the orthopedic-shoe-wearing fate of my ancestors, I am careful about wearing shoes that fit my feet. However, you get what you pay for, and shoes that fit well are not the cheapest, particularly heels.

Shoes are made from a last, which is a mold of the foot, from which the foot-bed is created and the shoe is shaped. A better-engineered last yields a shoe that’s better fitting and more sophisticated. Lasts are expensive to design and produce, highly coveted in the shoe world and a determining factor in the shoe price.

As consumers, we are attracted to a shoe’s appearance, but how do we know if the unseen last is a correct fit? The difficult reality is that the real job of a shoe is not to make to you look fabulous but to provide plain old arch support.

With your heel all the way in the back of the shoe, the widest part of your foot (the joint at your big toe) should line up with the widest part of the shoe. If you look at the foot-bed of any shoe, you will see where it is widest just before the toe-bed. That is where the arch support begins. Your heel must be in place not only to align your arch but also to be the axis for weight distribution.

Shoe size is determined by the distance from heel to joint at big toe. Toes are not part of the measurement. That is why pointed-toed shoes can be comfortable if the toe-bed is big enough, and buying shoes too big doesn’t equal comfort. Sometimes, especially in heels, you might need a “slip pad” in your shoe to keep your foot back.

Unlike in the past, when “comfort” equaled “ugly,” comfort is now chic, and a lot of brands incorporate comfort features. Your shoes should feel good on your feet, but there is no reason why they can’t also look amazing.

As a child, I wondered why Cinderella didn’t stop to pick up her shoe. As an adult, I know it’s because Cinderella is a fairytale. In real life, what woman would abandon her glass slipper no matter how uncomfortable?

Linda Soloniuk owns The Shoe Goddess Boutique in Redding.