KATE'S COW PRINT PALTFORM MULES

Kate from the I Can Make Shoes team found this gorgeous cow print shearling tucked away in a box in the studio. As soon as she stumbled upon it, she knew she had to make something with it right away!

Kate decided to go all out with this project. She used every single scrap of the shearling to cover the platform unit and make the uppers. She then added a cute black strap and buckle detail to the upper which I think totally pulls it all together 😍

Let's break it down:

First Kate gathered all of her materials; the cow print shearling, platform sole unit, tools, 2mm black resin soling, insole board, foam, buckles, upper pattern and leather.

Then she glued the platform unit with solvent based glue and the underside of the shearling with the same strong glue. 

Kate made sure to trim the shearling closely to the platform unit and then folded the edges over so that none of the platform block was exposed.

She then created a mule upper out of the same cow print shearling and backed it with plain black leather. Before stitching them together on the Janome HD9, she glued them together with water based glue. To make the mule upper, Kate used the Sandal Slider Pattern.

Kate decided to also make a cute leather strap to go across the top of the cow print upper. She just did this by backing some black leather with itself, cutting it into the width she wanted, punched some holes and added the buckle.

Kate then made a pattern for the insole and the sole. Once she had the pattern for the insole - she used this to trace out a left and a right foot on the insole board. She then added a layer of foam to these insoles and then covered them in leather (by coating the leather and the insoles with water based glue).

Once the insoles were prepared, Kate then made her sole. She used her sole pattern and traced out a left and a right foot on 2mm black resin soling. She then cut them out using the strong red scissors from our tool kit. Once the soles were cut out, she sanded the sides to make sure the edges were nice and smooth. Then when she was happy with the soles, she glued the base of the platform unit and the top of the sole with strong solvent based glue. After giving these a blast with the heat gun, she attached the soles to the platform unit.

Once the sole was attached, Kate attached the insole. She again glued the platform unit and the insole with the solvent based strong glue and gave these a blast with the heat gun. She then stuck them down to complete the shoes!