shoes

[Leprechaun 91]

Lovely work. As a 20 plus year shoe man, I can appreciate your skills. Iy is all too rare to find a real shoemaker in this modern age.

Remember Rabble, this man is no "shoe repairman" in some quickie mall shop. He is an artisan. If the price seems too steep, then you have no idea what goes into the production of such a product. My tam is off to you sir for your art.

I am actually looking at the "monk strap" look for my kilted wear. I think it is a more streamlined ,modern, if not Italian look. I think moving the buckle to the side adds to the comfort and streamlines it. (smaller buckle too.)

[Rollo]

Amazing shoes !

[Rex_Tremende]

<swoon>

[Sheep In Wolf's Clothing]

Very nice work!
Sara

[English Bloke]

What an amazing skill, beautiful shoes sir!!

[puffer]

IMHO, WOW!!!

I "PERSONALLY" feel that this type shoe is the ONE wear, if you are going to go Black Tie & definitely a MUST for White Tie. & the proper Jacket ( NOT a PC, IMHO)

Another idea is that by changing the "buckle" ( for the occasion ) it is "adaptable"

Sad to say, I only have a pair of "non custom" that I use for "dress period wear ( and the 2xs I "borrowed a DRESS JACKET for an event ) but if I went to more "DRESS" events, Your shoes would be in my "closet.)

Puffer

[piperdbh]

Here I go, chiming in again...

DWFII, would it be a lot of work to post a few "in progress" pics of a pair of shoes you're making? I've never seen that process, and I'd imagine several of the Rabble would like to see just exactly how you go about making such fine footwear. We've seen "in progress" pics of kilts, hose, cromachs, kilt pins, sgian dubhs and many other things being made, so I'd appreciate adding a pair of your shoes to that list. And if you want to give the shoes to a deserving member of our illustrious assemblage, I know a certain person whose size 12s would appreciate the gesture.

[DWFII]

I thank everyone for their kind remarks.

I could post photos of some techniques if there was enough interest. Bear in mind that this is a kilt forum and because my range is much larger than kilt shoes some of what I posted would be only peripherally related to kilts.

It is a complicated process, believe it or not...maybe moreso than one would expect of a Trade that was at its zenith in the latter half of the 19th century.

I once had a friend who was 25 or 30 years older than me (a mentor, really--taught me about reading rivers and fly-fishing for steelhead and making your own shooting heads as well as building fly rods) who had been a CPO in the navy when the first nuclear submarines were just coming on line. His specialty had been electronics...this was before transistors were really mainstream. In his spare time he built himself a television set...entirely of vacuum tubes!

In any case, he used to sit in my shop and watch me make boots. At one point he told me that he thought making shoes was a lot more complicated than building that TV. Of course, it's all a matter of perspective but he was dead serious...and I hope, not because I was making it more complicated than it needed to be.

The thing I worry about when posting photos is whether, even with a description, it would make any sense.

For instance, the main seam in a bespoke shoe is the "inseam." It holds all the leather and the welt to the insole. It is sewn with a thread, and a technique that goes back to the middle ages, which begins with linen yarn that is spun up into a cord with a very special wax comprised of pine pitch, rosin and oil or beeswax. That cord is twisted onto a boar's bristle (plucked from the ruff of a wild European boar) which then serves as a needle of sorts. A specially shaped awl is used to make a hole in the leather and the bristles are fed, one from each direction, to create a stitch. Round closing is done with the same technique and materials just more refined (in terms of size).

Speaking of round closing and "stabbing"...all stitching was done by hand before the advent of the sewing maching....Devlin, one of the "Elder Shoe Gods," wrote back in the early 1800's (1830?) that he had done some of this work at 64 stitches to the inch. And there are (at the Shoe museum in Northampton) surviving shoes and boots that give proof to this level of refinement. For a comparison, take the smallest machine needle that you can find and the smallest thread and try to sew as fine as you can on a piece of leather without "postage-stamping" it. About 30 to the inch will be remarkable, if you can get even that.

Devlin claims he did "64 to the inch" (all by hand) using an awl so fine that when he punctured the base of his thumb it neither bled nor hurt and that he substituted a hair from his daughter's head for the boar's bristle.

Well, see...my time is almost up and we haven't even begun to scratch the surface.

[Rex_Tremende]

That cord is twisted onto a boar's bristle (plucked from the ruff of a wild European boar) ...

That surely is the start of what could be a very amusing story to be told at cocktails. "And let me tell you how I almost lost an arm wrestling that wild boar to the ground..."


Regards,
Rex.

[Bugbear]

When I was a little kid, the town I grew up in still had leather workers, including a shoe maker; the ranchers etc usually had their saddles and boots made locally. Reading this thread brings back the memory of the smell of the leather shop.

I'm almost sure that is all gone. They do still have cowboy artests though.