New Shoes

Finally, after months of having parts laying around, and losing some of them, I've finished my next set of shoes.

These are patterened off of my previous shoes, which are modified from a pattern created from a 10'th century turn sole shoe. The stitches are all done by hand, using a crossed flesh-end stitch that results in nicely butted seams.

To make up for my relative inexperience as a cordwainer, (cobblers fixed shoes, cordwainers made them) I've strenghtened the seams by running a bead of super glue along the seams from the inside. I also added a coat of rubber cement to help make them water resistant.

Also, I chose to sew in a layer of rubberized sheeting inside the shoe. The material us usually used on the outside to give more traction, but I wanted to keep away from the non period look of the material, and chose to use it to strengthen the sole instead, and to use it as a high traction surface for my inserts to sit on. Yes, I'm using Dr. Scholls inserts for a little more cushion.

I chose to use a simple leather lace to tie the shoes. I'll eventually make a set of toggles, but I'm being lazy (I've got a lot of things to do before Estrella) and the laces are as period as dirt.

You might notice one looks slightly larger than the other. That's because one IS larger. This happens because of two reasons. First, I'm not a professional. Second, one of my feet IS larger than the other. Fitting the shoes to my feet results in variations in the appearance of each shoe. Hopefully, the better I get, the less visible the differences will be.