Visitors, shoes on or off?

I think it didn’t happen years ago. Who had light coloured, fitted carpets all over their house when we were young? Certainly not my relatives or friends.

Quarry tiles as you came in from the back door, lino nearly everywhere else, just a big carpet square/glorified rug in the middle of the (unused) ‘best’ room.

Plus doormats as you entered the property, which everyone wiped their feet on.

Any rugs were of a serviceable colour which wouldn’t ‘show the dirt’.

So no, to me it’s a new’ thing.

Is there a wrong or a right?

If you take yours off and your guests take them off as a matter of course, then that’s right.

If you keep yours on and are happy for your guests to do likewise, then that’s right.

If you oblige your guests to remove or retain their shoes, thats up to you.
Happily I’ve never been faced with that obligation in either direction.

Aveline

This was absolutely never done when I was young. It's a new thing that has sneaked in.

True, it was never a thing when I was growing up - unless of course shoes were wet or muddy.
Someone on a similar topic once said that ‘shoes on’ had always been an upper class thing, or only practised by relatively well off people, who could afford cleaners.

Balderdash! (I love that word 🙂). My mother only ever had a cleaner in her late 70s - hardly anyone among our friends or family did when I was younger.

I’m afraid to say that my mother always considered ‘shoes off’ a very lower-middle class thing, along with net curtains and other things I’d better not mention here.

My Gran who lived in a coal mining area in the NE. would have been totally bewildered if we had removed our shoes. Different customs then as now.

Aveline

This was absolutely never done when I was young. It's a new thing that has sneaked in.

Oh I disagree, I always took off my outdoor shoes when visiting my Grans, as did my parents, particularly the one that lived in the middle of the countryside down an unmade road.

This was absolutely never done when I was young. It's a new thing that has sneaked in.

I totally agree Witzend. I just could not bring myself to ask someone to remove their shoes just as I would be upset if someone asked me to do the same. Of course, if the shoes were dirty or it had been raining I would do it voluntarily.

I suppose if I had lovely pale carpets I might ask people to take off their footwear, but I don't . All my carpets are old. So I never ask anyone to do this.
A near neighbour has beautiful carpets, so I always slip my shoes off as I go in,, although he doesn't ask me to.

I think this asking visitors to remove shoes is a relatively recent thing, what do others think?
Just that I don’t remember any of my relatives or friends in the past asking it.We just breezed in happily.

We're all very polite ladies and gentlemen Witzend it's really not a problem.

Personally I consider it the height of bad manners to expect guests who’ve taken the trouble to dress up nicely for whatever you’re providing, to take their nice shoes off and go barefoot, or wear slippers - especially if not their own.

GrannySomerset

Must be a generational change I think because my contemporaries (75+) and I wouldn’t dream of asking people to take their shoes off - not an easy task for some of us. Company is much more important to me than carpets.

I am 83 GrannySomerset. Friends are all of similar age.

I am genuinely gobsmacked by this conversation. I don't think it's rude to ask people to take their shoes off. I actually think the opposite, it's rude to keep them on. Everyone I know takes their shoes off at my house without asking, as I do at their houses.

Averline I don’t agree I think posh people are much more likely to have these ways than those who are just glad to have a carpet and friends 🤣🤣🤣
Totally agree Grannysometset friends and visits are more important than shoes
I do have a funny story about it though I had a police chap who used to come round to our work through the community police initiative some years back and he kept trying to get a bit fresh with me and I was to be honest a bit fed up with it
Anyway one day I d been out for a walk with a friend who was a tall chap size 11 s he came back to mine for a coffee and took his boots off leaving them by the front door Halfway through the coffee the doorbell went I answered it and there stood the unwanted policeman he said ‘thought I just see how you are and have a coffee with you’ as he said it he looked down saw the big boots and added ‘but I ve just had a call out so I won’t stop’

I cannot see any reason that 'carers' are not permitted to use the blue overshoes.

I now live in a flat and with laminate floor throughout, so by the time visitors come through my front door they have already gone through public lobby, up stairs or lift, etc. so I do not expect them to remove shoes when coming in. I do for myself though, good quality slippers as soon as I return home, and do not wear these if I go out on my balcony,

When I go to visit anyone in their own home, I always take a pair of slippers with me.

When I lived in my house with a light cream stair carpet I insisted that blue overshoes were worn by anyone going upstairs.

We have hard flooring downstairs except for the living room where the carpet isn’t light in colour so it isn’t necessary for visitors to take their shoes off and we have never asked. We have light carpets upstairs and since we have a downstairs cloakroom nobody apart from us really goes upstairs as the grandchildren are older now and don’t stay over. We have always done our own decorating and maintenance so workers in the house are rare, the boiler is upstairs in the airing cupboard and the plumber always takes his shoes off when he comes to service it, we have never asked him to.

Must be a generational change I think because my contemporaries (75+) and I wouldn’t dream of asking people to take their shoes off - not an easy task for some of us. Company is much more important to me than carpets.

Our shoes off started by accident, spending a lot of time outside at the stables, bike tracks, football etc there was always a collection of shoes/boots in the lobby.

It became second nature to remove outdoor shoes before going into the main part of the house, visitors seeing the shoe collection started taking theirs off also.

I have never insisted that outdoor footwear be removed, it is just common practice within our friends and family.

This is a new thing to me. I had never come across it till recently, when a new young neighbour took his shoes off when he visited us. I think it very odd. We wear shoes for comfort , protection and warmth. Floors, carpeted or not, are for walking on.

I wouldn't ask anyone but workmen to remove shoes, as there us no way I would enter anyone's house with shoes I had been walking in and my friends certainly wouldn't.
When we entertained socially for drinks or supper people came dressed up then, so obviously wouldn't feel right them being barefoot. That problem doesn't arise now, as I step into my house, my house shoes are there and I slip into them, I don't like slippers, curled up on the sofa it's thick socks,

BlueBelle quite the opposite. Posh people don't have to worry about their floors.

I was once asked by an estate agent to take my shoes off when viewing a flat for my brother. I said either I view it with my shoes on or we leave 😬

I ve never been asked to remove my shoes and I ve never asked anyone to remove their shoes
Obviously my working class background 🤣

Most visitors offer to take their shoes off. I always say not to bother unless it looks like they’ve been trudging through a muddy field. To be expected to remove one’s shoes at a dinner party is just plain rude.

It seems to be a fairly new thing as I don’t remember ever being asked to remove shoes back in the day.

I don’t have carpets, just tiled floors which are easy to steam mop so I couldn’t care less if people keep their shoes on.

DD3 is obsessed about her floors despite having a dog who trots in and out without wiping his paws!
She has a box of shoe covers by the door and a shoe cupboard with slippers - I have my own pair but I find it very irritating when getting the boys ready having to sit on the steps putting on their shoes then remembering to change mine. (I've gone out in my slippers a few times!)

On a recent visit to the UK. I asked ‘Is it a shoes off or on house?’ on entering. Only two homes were shoes off and I understood as they had light carpets, but I hate being barefoot and feel undressed without my shoes on!