Shameless Plug!

Isabelle O'Carrol is a friend of a friend. I've never met her (well, apart from in the virtual world, on a bulletin board, but I've admired her style from afar. Isabelle wrote for the now defunct Catwalk Queen and now that Shiny Media has gone (credit crunched - heh) she is writing for the fabulous shoewawa and she has her own blog which I am shamelessly plugging, here.

Today she interviews VV Brown. Good luck with the new blog! :)

http://www.isabelleoc.co.uk

And another thing... Footwear technologists!

I know plenty of freelance footwear designers, but what about other freelancers? Those of you who deal with other 'bits' of the design process?

I'm interested to know if freelance footwear technologists exist (apart from in my own imagination).

I have a little shoe fitting project, perhaps only requiring one days work. If you are a freelance footwear technologist and you are reading this blog, please get in touch.

Thank you!
Shoenista.

Calling all shoemakers - I need new contacts!

I am frequently contacted by clients who are looking for one-off shoe designs to be made, or very small sample runs.

I will only get a factory involved in sampling if a client can place a bulk order -in the 100's for a formal footwear design, in the 1000's for athletic or casual footwear designs, this is because it simply isn't worth the factory's while to make such small amounts of production - they make a loss.

But I do like to help everyone who contacts me and I can if they are happy to work with a shoemaker.

My usual contact for one-off shoemaking is the lovely Trevor in Leyton, but he appears to have vanished! If anyone reading this has an up-to-date number for Trevor, I'd really appreicate it if they could contact me; also if anyone reading this is a shoemaker, with a workshop and has the facilities and skills to pattern cut and handmake shoe designs to order, I'd be very interested to hear from you, from time-to-time I have projects of this nature that I'm willing to pass on.

(Photo credit: Springline lasts)

Recycled shoes

Linky


It's always great to see someone pushing the envelope when it comes to recycling. I'm not sure if he is the only footwear designer making recycled shoes, there is another brand out there that does so. The footwear brand Softwalker, which has a factory in the UK, will laso make shoes out of your old jeans if you mail some to them. Link clicky

Anyway, well done Matt!

Love this t shirt

I spend waaay too much time on Google image search and on Bing (weird new name for the old windows image search), when I'm trying to resarch obscure footwear categories. It does turn up some fun stuff though, which I've now got use for because of this blog.

I love this t shirt!

Link!

Do I need Cad specs?

I'm being contacted lots of late to ask if I can make CAD specs of your shoe designs. Just to clarify, it's not always necessary.
In the world of fast fashion, there usually isn't time for a designer to make cad specs, so they send hand drawings to the factory. In the world of luxury fashion footwear, it is most unusual. Did you ever see uber shoe designer Manolo Blahnik with mouse in hand, working on his specs? Nope?
My advice is to ask the factory how they prefer to work, perhaps if they can provide you with the kind of spec that they are happy to work with. Then if the answer is 'CAD spec', it's time to enlist that freelance footwear designer to help you.

GPS shoes

Whatever next? A designer of orthopedic footwear and a gps tracking device manufacturer have just announced an agreement to develop GPS embedded orthopedic footwear for seniors with dementia. http://inventorspot.com/articles/gps_shoestracking_parents_alzheimers_disease_28685

How fascinating. I wonder if this could be extended? How about hiking boots with satnav in for lost hikers?