Fashion

What's the Average Heel Height in Your State?

by Erin Mayer

Lots of women love their stilettos — but how high is high enough? The online luxury shopping site Gilt put together a map of the average heel height in each U.S. state plus Puerto Rico and the results are rather telling. I'm a sucker for any data distilled into an adorable infographic, so I was pretty much guaranteed to be fascinated. For those of you more interested in the numbers, I'll do my best to sum up the results.

According to the Gilt Tech Blog (yup, it exists), the company's Data Scientist Igor Elbert "got a bit curious about whether certain fashion preferences might be regional or universal (or not)" and partnered with Data Analyst Debbie Chung to examine favorite dress colors per state — black all the way, baby! — and, now, heel heights. Let's take a look at what they found, shall we?

Turns out that New Yorkers, despite having Carrie Bradshaw as our spokeswoman, in no way favor the spikiest of heels. That honor went to Puerto Rico (the highest average at 2.87") and Florida (2.46"). Surprisingly enough, Arkansas also fell on the super high end. New York's average is a medium-height 2.09", which will come as a shock to anyone who has gone to a club in Midtown on a Saturday night. Among the most conservative states (as far as shoes go) are Wyoming, Kansas, and Nebraska, Maine.

Take a look at the infographic, designed by Rhianon Cha-os, to see where your state falls on the spectrum.

Images: Gilt Tech Blog