It's the final week of our handsewn shoemaking course and the students have been manfully getting on with cutting channels, stitching soles, shaping edges and building heels. Two days of finishing stand between them and a beautiful pair of finished shoes. We'll make sure that they get there. In the mean time here's a snapshot of the past week's activities...
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| Keeping the strops close by for trimming the sole edge |
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| Sole stitching |
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| Shaping the sole edge with the hammer |
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| Head down and music in for sole stitching |
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| Sole channels drying |
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| Abandoned threads |
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| Not what we were expecting - Eric's pie crust edge |
And something of a treat. Our blog pics are usually taken on our mobile phones, so it's lovely to be able to include some proper camera action. Here's a few beauties captured on Gerry's camera...
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| A happy Alex |
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| Twisting on bristles |
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| Hammer at the ready |
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| Our wall of lasts |
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| Riccardo deep in concentration |
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| The class tool trug |
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| Useful teaching aids - half made shoes at various stages |
Excuse a little gap here in continuity - they spent two intense days building heels with very good results. Straight at the sides and slightly pitched at the back - gorgeous!
Last two days is finishing. Starting with the rasping - very important for a smooth finish.
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| Rasping the heel |
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| Sensei Deborah demonstrates rasping... |
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| Aluminium oxide paper and sanding blocks in preparation for the sandathon to to come |
That's it for this week. Some interesting blog posts to come in the next few weeks from Spain and the USA.
And next week we will put images of the finished shoes for you to see the quality of the work done by the students. Until then, happy shoemaking!
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