Guns N' Roses / Black Pumas / Cam / Turkuaz / Jerry Harrison / Adrian Belew / Scott McCreery / Poi Dog Pondering / Sheila E. Violent Femmes / Soul Asylum / Deap Vallyĭog Eat Dog / Magnapop / Millionaire / Soul Asylum “You can feel, when you pull, that it stops at a certain point, and then the stitch is finished.Sponge / Soul Asylum / the nixons / Spin Doctors / Sister Hazel / Deep Blue Something “You really need to have strength,” she says. Repeat customers will get their shoes faster. The process, from order to delivery, takes six to eight months. Customer fittings also add to the timeline.
One pair of shoes takes about three weeks’ work, though this doesn’t include time when the shoes must dry, or waiting periods for materials. “I didn’t want it to have tourists every day coming in,” she says. She opened her workshop nearly 18 years ago just west of the heart of Florence. “When I started, everybody looked at me and said, ‘This lady is going to close down in a year,'” she says.
When she started in the male-dominated industry, people thought Wittmer wouldn’t physically be up to the job, with all the pulling, tugging, stretching, and tying that goes into the work. If the customer lives in Moscow, she knows the shoe will need a rubber sole that can stand up to harsh weather and snow. If the customer will be walking around in Dubai, she’ll select a very light material for the upper part of the shoe, something that might be too thin for London weather. Wittmer will ask where he will wear the shoe. Those important data points go into creating the last, which traditionally was made with wood but now is composed of hard plastic with bits of cork she carves into shape. To make the last, Wittmer starts by recording simple measurements while taking notes and observations on the customer’s needs: Does the heel of his shoe often slip off? Is additional support needed in a certain area? Is the back part of the foot particularly narrow? (That means customers have to return to the same shoemaker to use it again, or pay for another to be made elsewhere.) Wittmer makes about four pairs of shoes per month at her three-person workshop, called Saskia, starting at about $3,540 per pair, including the last, which always stays at the cobbler.
#LAST SOUL TRAIN SHOE HOW TO#
“Nobody shows you how to make a last, really, so you have to train it by yourself,” says the German-born Wittmer, 45, in her workshop in Florence, Italy, a city of shoemaking royalty. It’s creating what’s known as the “last,” the foot-shaped block that gives the shoe its shape. The most challenging step in making a bespoke shoe, cobbler Vivian Saskia Wittmer says, involves something that you won’t wear, ever.
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