Top Secret Shoes

I’ve always secretly wanted to be a spy.    I like to think I look so innocent that no one would ever suspect me, but I don’t think that’s how it works.  (Hey, a girl can dream.) 

But until October, I can be a spy at the Franklin Institute with their new exhibit SPY: The Secret World of Espionage!  I can try firsthand spy experiences like personal disguises, voice alteration, and navigating through a field of laser beams (AWESOME), but there’s also a lot of spy artifacts—including a pair of shoes bugged with a listening device in the heel!  Legit used by the Czechs to spy on us in the 1960s!  Spy shoes!!

If you too have always wanted to be a spy, I’ve got the shoes to help you get the job.  First: what are a spy’s favorite shoes?  SNEAKers!  Ha ha!  (Groan.)  But these sneakers might actually be helpful:

These sneakers have a hidden camera!  It has real time audio video recording with date/time stamping, and it comes with the receiver-screen thingy!  (Okay, so maybe I’m not ready to be a spy yet.  I’ll get there.)  But be warned, ladies: if you see a guy wearing these, watch for illicit upskirt video!  Also available in a few other shoe types, but this pair runs $288 from Omejo.

Camera shoes: check.  But what if you have to store secret stuff?  See these adorable wedges?

But wait!

The back opens!  And you can stash secret stuff!  Awesome.  The good people at Double Agent shoes have made a whole collection of heels with secret boxes in the back like this, or slim side pockets, or fully loaded with both!  The Panther just has the wedge box, and runs $299 (prices vary by style and number of secret compartments!).

But what if you need to make a quick getaway?  Get a little crafty and make yourself a pair of grappling hook shoes!

You can find the how-to at Instructables (including a video of the grappling hook in action), including some helpful thoughts on weight loads and engineering things like that.  The pulling-out-of-the-cord seems a bit much; I might try to make the cord retractable in the shoe.

Okay!  You’ve got the shoes!  Now to be trained:

Stiletto Spy School!  It’s got a shoe right in the name!  With daytime workshops in NYC and a weekend-long spy extravaganza in Las Vegas, Stiletto Spy School teaches women everything a lady spy needs to know: firearms.  Knife fighting.  How to tell if someone is lying.  Seduction and exotic dance.  (What?  Mata Hari was a spy!)  This seriously is my dream.  Stiletto Spy School, call me!

But if you don’t want to do all that, you can just go check out the exhibit instead. J  Over and out!