Real stories · The trainers my feet stopped complaining about

The soft breathable trainers that got me through a whole day at the coast — and the grippy sole that saved me on the wet cobbles

Shoes I could walk in all day without my feet filing a formal complaint by two o'clock — that's all I ask of footwear these days, and it's remarkable how rarely I get it. I'm 67, I walk Winnie twice a day, and York is a city of beautiful, treacherous wet cobbles. My old trainers had gone hard and slippery underneath, and anything smart pinched across the top of my foot where it's fussiest. By the end of a day out I'd be doing that hobble women my age know all too well.

What I wanted was ordinary and oddly hard to find: soft on top, cushioned underneath, air getting in, and a sole I could trust on a wet pavement.

Then I found the Elara from a British label called York Boutique — and my feet have had nothing to report since, which is the entire job description of a shoe.

The upper is a breathable mesh blend, soft and slightly stretchy, so it gives where feet are wide or fussy instead of pinching — and your feet don't cook in them by lunchtime the way they do in stiff leather-look trainers. Underneath there's a cushioned sole with a proper non-slip tread, which is the part I'd actually been nervous about: wet cobbles by the Minster have had me windmilling more than once. Not in these. They grip, quietly, the way good tyres do.

Soft where my feet are fussy, airy enough that they don't cook, and a sole that actually grips York's wet cobbles. I did eleven thousand steps at the coast and had nothing to report — which is the whole point of a shoe.

The real test was a day trip to Whitby with my sister — the hill, the abbey steps, the harbour, eleven thousand steps by supper. I waited for the two o'clock hobble and it simply never arrived. My sister has since bought the same pair, which in our family is how a product receives its knighthood.

They were £24.95 in the summer sale, half the usual £50. I'd checked before ordering that I could send them back if the fit was off — you can, within a fortnight, and the delivery's free — so there was nothing lost by trying. They come in eight colours and in sizes 4 to 9.5; I have the grey, which goes with everything I own.

If your feet also start filing complaints by mid-afternoon, do treat yourself to a look. The Elara is rated 4.5 out of 5 by more than 400 women, it's £24.95 in the summer sale instead of £50 — half price — and the middle sizes always seem to go first.