Making your own shoes gets trendy

After two years running workshops in Dunedin, shoemaker Louise Clifton is setting up shop in the capital as demand for her skills continues to grow nationwide.

Clifton is set to officially open a bright new studio space in Newtown in December but already she’s started running workshops for a handful of Wellingtonians who had been eagerly awaiting her arrival.

‘‘I live out the back of the studio and I can actually hear people on the street talking about the shoe school and I have been getting plenty of inquiries.’’

The decision to move the operation north was an easy one for Clifton, with the amount of travel she was doing to and from Dunedin becoming unsustainable.

‘‘I was travelling, trying to build a reputation as a shoemaker and it was getting tiring so I wanted to settle somewhere.

‘‘I was coming up to Wellington quite a lot so I figured it was a good fit.’’

Clifton runs several workshops ranging in length from one to five days, where participants can create their dream pair of shoes with their own two hands.

‘‘I’m not alone in craving the satisfaction of making a pair of shoes by hand. It’s an experience that transcends the everyday. For many students, it represents the opportunity to effect change. If they can craft a pair of shoes, what else can they achieve?’’

While Clifton’s passion for shoe-making dates back to her teenage years, it was upon finding herself jobless in Dunedin that she decided to pursue the craft seriously, going so far as to move to Tasmania to learn from an expert craftsperson there.

‘‘It was a chance to chase a dream so I sold all my stuff to travel to Australia and I had an epiphany as soon as I got there that this was what I wanted to do.’’

Upon her return, Clifton set about launching a business crafting infant footwear. With the profits she bought antique shoemaking equipment and then set up her long-anticipated Shoe School.

Since her first workshop in late 2015, Clifton has helped her pupils design and craft more than 150 pairs of shoes.

‘‘Some people have gone on to start their own shoemaking studios and some are just doing it so they have a pair of shoes that fit really well.

‘‘Shoe School is like a call to adventure outside the safety of everyday life. Making a pair of shoes is a challenge and when you shape the materials into what you’ve been imagining it’s a triumph.’’