What I wore this week: tan shoes | Jess Cartner-Morley

I have been through every iteration of non-black shoe and have come to the conclusion that the shoe of eternal summer is tan

In summer I ditch black shoes. The first tinny siren call of an ice-cream van and I swap black shoes for pale ones. I have been through every iteration of non-black shoe and have come to the conclusion that the shoe of eternal summer is tan. Or caramel, or toffee, even just brown.

Call it what you will, except please don’t call it nude. Nude shoes are the last word in naff. Say the words Leg-Lengthening Nude Court in fashionable company and people will recoil. And not in an ironic, guilty-pleasure, bonding over Love Island kind of way, but in an embarrassed silence kind of way. Nude isn’t a colour, there being no singular shade of skin. But in the shoe business, nude has come to refer to the colour of the sheer hosiery female members of the royal family wear on official engagements. It is a slightly unnatural shade of glossy, pinky brown. A couple of weeks on a sun lounger, topped with a slick of pearlised lipgloss. Where the chic summer accessory tone is darker. More deeply saturated, more earthy.

Related: What I wore this week: cropped trousers | Jess Cartner-Morley