https://redshoemovement.com/meaning-of-the-red-shoes-rsm/

who knew there was a movement? empowering women- includes a history of red shoes…

"Hans Christian Andersen wrote “The Red Shoes.” This story talked about Karen, a poor girl who, after her mother’s death, is adopted by an elderly, blind woman. One day Karen discovers a pair of red shoes peaking from under the dress of a princess and she’s overcome by the desire to own a pair. Unable to resist her vanity, she gets her adoptive mother (who can’t see the color) to buy her red shoes. Against the orders of the clergy in her church, Karen wears them for her Confirmation and her Communion eliciting negative feelings in the community.

Those red shoes become her obsession and her demise. Once she puts them on, Karen starts dancing frenetically and is unable stop. With a life of their own, the shoes take her into the woods and end up getting her all scratched and hurt. Eventually, exhausted and bloody, Karen ends up in front of the door of the town’s executioner. As punishment for her sins, Karen asks the executioner to cut off her feet and shoes rather than her head. So he does and the feet with the red shoes fly away. The story continues for a bit but the moral seems to be that the red shoes symbolize some obscure desire, the vain nature of Karen, which at the time was considered a big sin."

this leaves out that the red shoes prevent her from entering church until she prays for Gods help… the curse is lifted.