How to Make One-piece Shoes for Children

Reader Contribution by Sharon Raymond and Simple Shoemaking
Published on February 3, 2021
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Imagine how many pairs of shoes a child grows out of before their eighteenth birthday — it might be a good idea to make some of them! When you make children’s shoes, they will be made of materials that you feel good about and will have a healthy shape and minimal structure to simulate being barefoot.

They are also locally-made — and they are a bargain! In fact, if you make shoes from thrift shop leather items or felted old wool coats, and then use the recommended bicycle or motorcycle inner tube for soling, they are practically free.

I have spent several decades trying to figure out the simplest and most ecological ways to make footwear. Because the footwear industry is responsible for a sizeable share of our earthly pollution during the manufacturing, transporting, and disposing of the more than one billion shoes manufactured each year, I believe it can be empowering to realize that you can ameliorate all of these issues by making shoes yourself.

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