The origins of the story came from an incident that he witnessed as a small child, apparently one day his father was given some red silk by a rich lady customer to make a pair of dancing slippers for her daughter, and using some red leather Hans's father worked carefully on the slippers. But the customer had complained that he only spoiled her silk and, so his father told the woman he might as well spoil his leather too, and cut up the slippers right in front of her.