I make shoes. With no cobblering tools or training other than what I’ve been able to find in a few obscure books. That probably qualifies me as insane right there. In the past I have made several pairs of shoes for myself on homemade lasts, and lots of baby shoes. Now I’ve made doll shoes. Actually these aren’t the first doll shoes but these are the first that are actually made of leather and made with fairly traditional shoemaking techniques. I won’t bore you with the details. Alexia, is my daughter’s Liv fashion doll. Along with her rather garish outfit, she arrived with plastic boots. So although I have yet to make her any new clothes, I suddenly decided to make her new shoes today. Her feet are about an inch long, I don’t know exactly because I didn’t measure anything. These were a very simple pair of slip-ons made of thin suede and leather scraps leftover from baby shoes and a tiny scrap of floral cotton for the insole. I actually did not do any sewing, I used fusible web to construct these. My intention was to sew after but it doesn’t seem necessary. We’ll see how they hold up.
Usually you buy the shoes to match the outfit right? Well…in this case I had picked up a pair of white mary jane style tennis shoes on sale with the idea of decorating them in some way for the girl. I had in mind to do something with red to go with several red outfits in her wardrobe. For several years I have had an image of a graphic flower in my head but didn’t know what to do with it. It came to mind and after quite a few pencil sketches, I got out the fabric dyes (
After I finished the shoes I realized that they were not going to look right with any of the cute red outfits she already had so then I had to make a dress to match the shoes. I drafted a simple A-line shift pattern and used fusible web and a zigzag stitch to apply the variegated red and black border on the white dress. The poppy-like flowers are set off-center. While I’ve used fusible web to applique before, this was a much more complicated process and I did go a bit crazy cutting out all the right pieces! Not pictured is the very cool elastic keyhole neck in the back. My independent girl prefers to dress herself so rather than use a button or snap closure, I made a small casing at the top of both sides of the keyhole opening and inserted elastic. When worn, the elastic does not show at all. I should have a picture of that huh?
