Sunday, September 19, 2010

Back...At Long Last

I'm finally back! I spent three weeks of vacation at home and the past three weeks getting settled back into the swing of things in Italy and at work, and despite my best intentions, I managed to write nothing! But that doesn't mean I haven't been working on new things. The wedding-shoe-making has officially begun...

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The lasts - I covered the external half of one of the lasts with masking tape and then drew the design straight onto the tape.


Then I took off the tape and pressed it down flat onto a piece of paper, corrected the curves, and created the internal lines (lasts, and feet for that matter, are not symmetrical and there are certain adjustments that need to be made the "external" line to make it fit correctly on the "internal" side). This base is called the camicia.


The final camicia - external lines in black, internal lines in red. This base is used to make the pattern pieces.


All the pattern pieces to make the shoe: including the upper (tomaia), lining (fodera), and reinforcements (rinforzi).


Gluing together the pieces cut out in leather


The finished upper (glued for the test run, but it will be stitched for the final shoe)


The lasted sample with the lining yet to be trimmed away