Posted on September 28, 2008 - by Chezlin
Oh my god, shoes.
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I’m not even going to try to come up with excuses as to why I haven’t posted in forever… I’ll just get to the good stuff.
My little sister had some shoes she didn’t really care for anymore, and asked if I could re-cover them for her. I had seen an article in Craft Magazine where they had done this so I knew it could be done.
Here are the shoes in question:
So following the instructions in that magazine, I whip out my exacto knife and start cutting.
Basically you cut all of the fabric off.. All of it! Also, not pictured is me ripping out the inside of the shoe. The bottom cushioned part.. thing. Be careful when you do this though, because you’ll need them later.
The remains of the shoes. As you can see, I kind of rushed ripping out the bottom parts.
Next, I took the fabric she chose and used the old shoe fabric to make a pattern. You might not want to use markers here to draw it out… I just usually end up grabbing the closest thing to me when I’m doing this sort of thing.
I also drew out and cut the pattern out with the inside fabric, shown here. These are the tongues of the shoes. (I also cut them with the houndstooth fabric as well)
Sew those puppies up. I used the old fabric from the shoe as a guide for the decorative sewing.
Sorry, bad picture.. Me grommeting the holes for the laces.
A crappy, blurry picture of the new pieces with the old pieces. As you can see, I added a little more on the bottom of the tongue because I wanted to make sure I had enough. I ended up cutting off some when I put it in, but I figured that was better then not having enough!
More unpictured steps are where I glued in the fabric. I glued in at least 1/4 inch of the fabric all around the bottom edge of the shoes, glued the tongue in and finally the bottom cushioned part back in place. If done right, the fabric for the main part of the shoe should be sandwiched between the sole of the shoe and the cushioned part that was glued in last.
I waited for the glue to cure and whatnot before I laced them up because I didn’t want to accidentally rip out the fabric.
What I did though, was put the shoes on (unlaced) to put some weight on the shoes so it would be stuck real good!
Ta da! All laced up and ready to go!
I’m hoping to take some better pictures of the shoes soon. When I do I’ll make sure to post them up!
33 Comments
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September 28, 2008
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Cassandra said:
This is so cool, but i dont think that i’ll try it anytime soon.
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September 28, 2008
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Pat said:
WOW! I never would have thought of this. This is GREAT!
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September 28, 2008
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Jannell said:
Really really cool. I actually love this entire blog and will check back often. I need to start posting more tasty entries like this. Craft on, dude.
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September 28, 2008
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Amelia said:
These are SO cute!
I would pay money for these <3
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September 28, 2008
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wren said:
what kind of glue did you use? just regular elmers glue or craft glue or what?
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December 1, 2008
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Chezlin said:
For these shoes, I used E6000 which has been working well for me so far. However, I am interested in using this shoe goo that NetMom, in the comment under this one, recommended.
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September 28, 2008
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NetMom said:
Want to make the shoe last longer? A friend turned me onto shoe goo, which is kinda like a contact cement for shoes. It comes in a huge fecking tube, but I use a q-tip stick to thin spread it on the seams of the shoe where the sole and fabric meet. It’ll keep it from coming apart as fast. Used this tip for years on regular shoes, and mine have always lasted for ages.
But, to join in the other comments, I do think your work is absolutely wild. You’ve touched on so many subjects, so many different types of crafts that you make me want to do more things myself. Thank you for being an inspiration.
Now…. where did I leave that yarn and hook?
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December 1, 2008
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Chezlin said:
Thanks for your suggestion! I’ll definitely look into that shoe goo stuff, I plan on doing more shoes like this!
Thanks
I’m glad that you like my crafts 
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September 29, 2008
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fccfu said:
I though that’s why we have sweat shops???
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December 1, 2008
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Chezlin said:
Hur hur.
Wouldn’t you like to have a customized pair of shoes? That’s what this post is all about!
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September 29, 2008
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pooty tang said:
very cute! you are a good sister!
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October 1, 2008
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cary said:
I’m very jealous! Those are sweet!
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October 3, 2008
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Katie said:
I’m all about revamping things instead of tossing them. I LOVE that you have shown in plain English the steps involved. The only question I had was what type of glue to use. I see in someone else’s comments a suggestion so I’ll try that! Thanks for a great post!
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December 1, 2008
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Chezlin said:
Thanks! I use E6000 glue, it’s so awesome. Although, someone mentioned that for shoes, you should use shoe goo.. which I will probably invest in sometime.
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October 3, 2008
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Amanda said:
Wow that is incredible! You make it look so easy to make new shoes!! So jealous!
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October 13, 2008
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greg samlin said:
thems some fine shoes there. where might one purchase this shoe goo? and is it overly expensive?
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December 1, 2008
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Chezlin said:
From what I’ve seen, a tube of about 4.8 ounces is $8.70 on Amazon (but it says list price is like $14 regularly) so, yeah
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November 20, 2008
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katie n said:
I have a pair of boots I feel in love with from payless and they are like those (canvas). They are falling apart so I am gonna get seme kick booty fabric and redo them. You just saved my favorite shoes! THANK YOU
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December 1, 2008
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Chezlin said:
I’m so glad I helped you out and inspired you to fix them!! You should send some pictures my way whenever you fix them
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December 12, 2008
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joe said:
My goodness, how good is that?
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December 12, 2008
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tiffani said:
those shoes are so uggo
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December 17, 2008
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n s sunilkumar said:
hi chezzzz……….lin
the 3 z and the dots between ur other wise strange name is my way of expressing a mere hint of awe.
its very cool that you have done so many little things and they are wonderful.
i am a designer from india. well prety much at the start of my career… so i appreciated what ever you are turning up as craft.
if you are interested you can commercialize your talents and earn some cool bucks… (ie. if you are already not doing it….)
would love to keep in touch with you in ur future projects. hav my mail id incase u wanna share some ideas…
nssunilkumar@gmail.com
best wishes
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December 17, 2008
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Caley said:
Neat! I love the spirit of revamp. Just stumbled across your blog (literally, isn’t Stumble Upon fantastic?) and will definitely be keeping an eye.
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February 8, 2009
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Bhogan said:
i stumbled here 2 i love this stumble shit i would have never seen this
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December 21, 2008
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Emilie said:
Those turned out awesome!
I customized a pair of converse once but I’ve never totally ripped out all the fabric… thats hard core!
(if you want to check out the way I customized mine… Here ) instructions are on page 2
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January 8, 2009
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Chezlin said:
Awesome!! Those are great, my younger sister actually wanted to try to re-do some of her shoes like you did, too!
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February 8, 2009
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Bhogan said:
u r really talented have u ever thought about being a designer. ur kind of cute 2
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February 12, 2009
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Tom said:
I think this is great. Really great. Keep going. Tom
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July 30, 2009
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Lisa said:
woho,that is so cool.
thanks for share it.
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August 18, 2009
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Iris said:
hey what was the date of this craft magazine you got this fun? Thx that would help me alot
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October 17, 2009
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Hannah said:
This is really cool! I might try it sometime, idk if i want to risk hurting my shoes though
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December 4, 2009
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Lisa said:
This is such a great idea!!!! I can’t wait to try it. These make great gifts!!!
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December 12, 2009
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Leah said:
These are soo awesome holy crap! I’m so excited I need to do this! What kind of fabric did you use!?
and where did you pick up the glue from?