Shoe Tutorial

Ask and ye shall receive!!

(this is going to be long)

Start cutting!

 I cut off the toe of the shoe because I didn't want to keep it, but I wish I wouldn't have.

But I am not sure you could glue the shoe back together with it there.

 Make sure to save the sole of the shoe. 

You will be needing that again.

Be careful taking out the sole too. They glue it down pretty well.

Anyway, cut away!!

Make your pattern, 

I just went for it on the canvas I had. I didn't actually make a pattern.

I added about 2 inches (I maybe should have added more)

 to the bottom of the upper black part you see here.

It is needed because this will need to go down and be glued to the sole of the shoe.  

Here are the pattern pieces. It's a lot. 

8 upper pieces, 4 tongues, 4 strips for some extra reinforcement (it will be explained) 

I wouldn't make the tongue much bigger than the actual, I will explain later

Because I had white canvas on hand, I used it.

But obviously, you don't have to do something like this.

I went a little crazy.... 

Start sewing your shoe. 

This is where the extra reinforcement straps come in handy. 

For the grommets for the laces.

Follow the yellow line when sewing each upper part.

Now sew them together. As shown on the left here:

Make sure the seams are flat, this is going to be on the back of your foot.

Think comfort here.

I did sew a little double action here, which doesn't look very pretty.

I wasn't using an industrial machine. But it works.

Grommets

This is what I used. Yes it is enough, but both shoes have gold and silver grommets.

They are already a little extreme to begin with, so I didn't care. But if you want all silver grommets

buy 2 packages. 

Mark the placement of the holes.

Once they are drawn, you can fix them a little, or a lot.

See gold and silver.

More sewing

Sew the tongue of the shoe (not pictured) Serge around the edges. 

Pin the upper of the shoe to the tongue. I put the shoe back together on my table and tried to copy it. 

I wish I would have put less space between the upper parts (where the grommets are)

All sewn and ready to be glued!

Glue

I wanted Shoe Goo but I couldn't find any here in my little town,

so I got this instead. I'm sure anything will work as long as it glues fabric.

Clean the sole

This takes some time. I tried to get as much fabric and glue and crap of as I could. 

Again, think comfort, I don't want to walk on all that stuff. 

Start gluing. 

(This is where the toe part that is rubber would get in the way,

that is why I cut it off)

Follow the instructions on the glue, mine said to wait until tacky, maybe 5-10 minutes,

seemed like it took forever!!!!!!

Oh! I just used my fingers to spread this around.

This glue cleans up with water, so I wasn't worried about my skin.

I drew a line around the upper, for where it meets up with the rubber around the shoe. 

Does that make sense?? 

See the faint line? Below the grommets?

(I tired to get the best picture I could while I was gluing, but it didn't really work.)

Start with the center, of the tongue, and front of shoe, and line them up.

Just go for it. Your finger tips will be covered with glue. It's fun! 

Waiting for them to completely dry. I thought it looked weird without the toe covering thing

That's why I glued them back on. 

Once they have dried glue the sole back in the bottom of the shoe. 

As you can see in the picture below, the upper doesn't meet up with the toe covering. 

(look closely, I promise)

 So that is why I wish I would have made the tongue just a little smaller. 

All in the learning process! 

If you have additional questions just email me. 

This is my first and only time ever doing this, so I am no pro!!

But I will do my best to answer any questions you have!!