diff --git a/swiftclient/client.py b/swiftclient/client.py
index 988c7d9c..a39185f2 100644
--- a/swiftclient/client.py
+++ b/swiftclient/client.py
@@ -211,6 +211,13 @@ def quote(value, safe='/'):
 
 
 def encode_utf8(value):
+    if type(value) in six.integer_types + (float, bool):
+        # As of requests 2.11.0, headers must be byte- or unicode-strings.
+        # Convert some known-good types as a convenience for developers.
+        # Note that we *don't* convert subclasses, as they may have overriddden
+        # __str__ or __repr__.
+        # See https://github.com/kennethreitz/requests/pull/3366 for more info
+        value = str(value)
     if isinstance(value, six.text_type):
         value = value.encode('utf8')
     return value
diff --git a/tests/functional/test_swiftclient.py b/tests/functional/test_swiftclient.py
index 6e19abdb..0e6a3463 100644
--- a/tests/functional/test_swiftclient.py
+++ b/tests/functional/test_swiftclient.py
@@ -400,10 +400,19 @@ class TestFunctional(unittest.TestCase):
     def test_post_object(self):
         self.conn.post_object(self.containername,
                               self.objectname,
-                              {'x-object-meta-color': 'Something'})
+                              {'x-object-meta-color': 'Something',
+                               'x-object-meta-uni': b'\xd8\xaa'.decode('utf8'),
+                               'x-object-meta-int': 123,
+                               'x-object-meta-float': 45.67,
+                               'x-object-meta-bool': False})
 
         headers = self.conn.head_object(self.containername, self.objectname)
         self.assertEqual('Something', headers.get('x-object-meta-color'))
+        self.assertEqual(b'\xd8\xaa'.decode('utf-8'),
+                         headers.get('x-object-meta-uni'))
+        self.assertEqual('123', headers.get('x-object-meta-int'))
+        self.assertEqual('45.67', headers.get('x-object-meta-float'))
+        self.assertEqual('False', headers.get('x-object-meta-bool'))
 
     def test_copy_object(self):
         self.conn.put_object(
diff --git a/tests/unit/test_swiftclient.py b/tests/unit/test_swiftclient.py
index 00954479..7e753e93 100644
--- a/tests/unit/test_swiftclient.py
+++ b/tests/unit/test_swiftclient.py
@@ -185,9 +185,9 @@ class TestHttpHelpers(MockHttpTest):
 
     def test_encode_meta_headers(self):
         headers = {'abc': '123',
-                   u'x-container-meta-\u0394': '123',
-                   u'x-account-meta-\u0394': '123',
-                   u'x-object-meta-\u0394': '123'}
+                   u'x-container-meta-\u0394': 123,
+                   u'x-account-meta-\u0394': 12.3,
+                   u'x-object-meta-\u0394': True}
 
         r = swiftclient.encode_meta_headers(headers)
 
@@ -199,6 +199,7 @@ class TestHttpHelpers(MockHttpTest):
         for k, v in r.items():
             self.assertIs(type(k), binary_type)
             self.assertIs(type(v), binary_type)
+            self.assertIn(v, (b'123', b'12.3', b'True'))
 
     def test_set_user_agent_default(self):
         _junk, conn = c.http_connection('http://www.example.com')