Ugh, real life.
Officials at a seaside town in Taiwan have come up with a, well, unique idea to attract more women to go to church.
Ready for the ingenious plan? It’s to construct a giant shoe church made almost entirely out of glass.
The Daily Mail reports that the huge high-heeled structure was completed earlier this week – and that the house of God is due to open before Chinese New Year falls on February 8th.
Source: giphy
Constructed almost entirely out of blue glass, the giant stiletto is 55 feet tall and 36 feet wide, and is located at the Ocean View Park in Budai.
The paper reports that there will be a total of 100 female-oriented features in the church, including chairs for ‘lovers’, maple leaves, biscuits and cakes, all of which they believe will draw in female visitors looking to take 'romantic photographs' - whatever that means.
We’re all for unusual architecture, but we have to say that we find this concept just a little bit patronising.
Is this really the only method of drawing in female worshippers?
Something tells us that if you want to go to church, you’ll go to church, and if you don’t, you won’t, regardless of what the church looks like.
Yes, women quite like shoes, but we'd like to hope we're able to construct and consider arguments beyond ‘Flats or heels? Leather or suede? Louboutin or New Look?’
There’s no doubt that the new church will attract visitors keen to photograph the new landmark, but the idea itself smacks of reductive stereotyping, and frankly, laziness.
We'd never say no to a new pair of shoes – but there is a limit, and this is just plain offensive.
See what the new shoe church looks like in the video below…
What do you think of the new house of God? Offensive – or just a great way of drawing in new visitors? Let us know @marieclaireuk