Tag: shoes

More slippers, and an exhibition!

, your slippers are finished! I hope you like them. 🙂

This pair were made to fit a drawing of ‘s feet, which she sent to me using the Power of the Internet. I now need to post them across the Atlantic, and hope that they fit when they get there!

Tiger slippers!

These are made in the same way as the monkey slippers. The uppers are made from plush tiger fabric lined with gold satin, and interfaced with a layer of batting for extra softness. The inner soles are made from gold satin and white cotton, with a layer of 1″ foam and a piece of buckram sandwiched in between. The outer soles are felt, edged with blanket stitch in a strong buttonhole thread.

I learnt a few things while making this pair – namely when it’s better to use a curved upholstery needle, and when a straight one is more effective.

Next up will be two little pairs for Daniel and Edward, my colleague’s sons. They’ll both be made of polar fleece, so they should be really squashy and cute!

Oh yes, the art exhibition!

I’ve received an email via Etsy, from a local ceramic artist. She’s asked me whether I’d like to have some of my badges included in an exhibition that she’s putting on in Henley in July.

I’ve mailed back to ask for more information, but this is the first time I’ve been invited to take part in anything like this, so I’m very excited about it!

More slippers…

The monkey slippers are finished!

I added some felt soles, with a decorative blanket stitch to neatly finish off the edges. I hadn’t worked blanket stitch for approximately 28 years, but it was lovely to have a look through my Great Aunt’s sewing book from 1940, for a little refresher course. 🙂

Almost finished slippers! Monkey slippers - the finished soles

I love these monkey slippers with a fiery passion, and I have managed to find a single fat quarter of the same fabric, but with the nuts/gourds in purple rather than brown. If I buy it, I can make one more pair of monkey slippers… or of course you can all have something different!

I’ve also finished my second pair of slippers – these are a slip-on mule style, made from skull and crossbones print fleece.

Skull fleece slippers

The uppers are made from two layers of fleece, with a layer of denim sandwiched in between for strength. The soles are made from a layer of fleece, then denim, then heavy buckram, and finally felt on the bottom. (This is what the soles look like.)

The monkey slippers have a layer of foam rubber in the sole, which makes them extremely squashy and comfortable to walk on. They feel a bit tight the first time you put them on, but after a couple of days the foam compacts down nicely. The mule slippers don’t have any foam in the soles at all, which is something I want to change about them. I think it would be nice if they were a bit softer. I also need to make some changes to the felt soles, to make them a little safer. They’re a bit slippery on laminate flooring – I’ve almost gone skating a couple of times!

If anybody would be interested in buying the skull slippers, they’re a size 6/39, and can be yours for the bargain prototype price of a fiver!

I’m not taking formal customer orders for slippers yet, but if you’d like to help me by testing out a slightly experimental pair (possibly involving you drawing around your feet), please drop me a comment, and we can work something out. 🙂

Everybody needs monkey slippers!

Monkey slippers!

Today I have been mostly making monkey slippers!

I promised to make a pair of slippers for a friend, so I thought I’d better make a prototype for myself first, to figure a few things out. I had just enough monkey fabric left from my Superbuzzy order, so I couldn’t resist using it up.

I have plans to make some more, probably out of fleece, and a slip-on/mule style with some of my leftover fancy fabrics. This is all part of the Grand Shoe Plan, but I figured that slippers would be a good starting point.

This is how I made them…

Pieces for a pair of monkey slippers.
Here you can see (almost) all of the necessary pieces. For the uppers, there’s the monkey fabric. For the lining I used some cream poly/cotton, which is fused to a piece of batting. (That’s the squashy stuff.) For the soles, there are two pieces of cream poly/cotton, each fused to heavy interfacing. Between them goes a piece of 1″ upholstery foam.

Insoles and uppers, ready to go...
These are the upper pieces, sewn together and turned right sides out, and the sole pieces with the foam sandwiched between them.

Insoles and uppers pinned together...
The uppers and the soles pinned together. I learnt a few things at this stage:

  • Press the uppers before you sew them on to the soles
  • Don’t bother pinning and machine basting. Hand basting is actually quicker and easier for this.
  • If you have a fine upholstery needle.

I also left out the elastic which was suggested for the back of the heel. The slippers do stay on without it, but I think I’ll be adding it in next time, to stop them from gaping.

Almost finished slippers!
Ta-daa! They look finished!

Slippers with no sole...
Until you turn them over…

I’ll be buying felt for the soles tomorrow! I might also add a bit of decorative top stitching around the uppers.

And there you have it. Monkey slippers!

[edit] I forgot to say – I made these using Burda 7978 as a starting point, and then getting creative with a book about making your own shoes. Feel free to make your own!

El Naturalista – Iggdrasil

I’ve just bought a lovely new pair of shoes.

Aren’t they nice?

The reason I thought they were worth mentioning is that El Naturalista go to great lengths to make their shoes as eco-friendly as possible. In their eco-policy they explain how they use recycled rubber for the soles; a product which would normally be classed as industrial waste. They also promise:

To promote natural materials and dyes
To avoid polluting substances
To protect and sustain the environment
To use biodegradable substances where possible
To recycle materials where possible
To pay producers fair prices
To promote traditional skills
To support appropriate technology
To operate with transparency

And they make gorgeous, comfortable shoes in lots of lovely colours!

You can buy them online from the El Naturalista website. In the UK, they’re also available in Jones the Bootmaker, Footprints, Shoon and Schuh.

Painted Shoes.

For health reasons which are far too boring to go into, I am currently selling twenty-one pairs of shoes. I am saving up to buy a pair of custom-fitted orthotic insoles, which basically restricts me to flat, boring, sensible shoes for evermore.

Of course, I am now seeing nothing but fabulous shoes, everywhere I turn! This month’s Elle magazine arrived with a “shoes & handbags” supplement. The newest issue of Simply Knitting (where I thought I would be safe!) has a picture of some amazingly-decorated mosaic shoes. And now Hannah has been painting on her shoes.

Hannah also links to more painted shoes and clogs:

Åsa Westlund has a range of beautifully painted high-heeled Swedish clogs. Even if you’re not keen on the style, there’s no denying that the artwork is absolutely beautiful.

I used to have a little collection of swedish clogs (the flat kind), until an attack of mould in the hideous basement where I was living infiltrated the wooden soles, and rendered them all wet and irreparable. Now, of course, I wish I hadn’t looked for pictures of clogs. I miss my patent purple pair (which all my friends kindly referred to as “those sawn-off wellies”), and I didn’t know they were now available printed with dinosaurs, cartoons and skulls!

I’m not allowed to wear clogs any more, so clearly I need to be looking at painted shoes instead. Etsy has some beautiful work, from two sellers in particular.

Hippy of Doom has the most beautiful ballet pumps painted with a Hokusai wave design. She also has an adorable pair featuring the tree spirits from Princess Mononoke.

Miss Bunny‘s hand-painted shoes often have an Alice in Wonderland theme. My absolute favourites were these “Eat Me, Drink Me” shoes, which some lucky buyer must now be wearing with great joy.

Friends keep telling me that I should paint my own shoes, to make my disappointing orthopaedic future a little less dull. (Somebody in the USA has had this idea already!) I have painted Doc Martens, baseball boots and leather jackets in the past, but taking a paintbrush to a pair of extremely expensive shoes seems a bit scary. Mind you, it can’t be more intimidating than reproducing an album cover or a photograph on the back of someone else’s expensive leather jacket.

Maybe I should grab an old pair of shoes and a paintbrush, and give it a go.