I designed this outsole, when we were working on nautical-themed designs. The lines and anchor would be recessed and when you walk, like in semi-hard sand on your nautical adventure, your shoe would leave this impression behind. I like it and if I had my own footwear line, I would put it in. Hell, I would do an entire line based on nautical loveliness. Not preppy nautical, mind you. But some sort of vacation, classic, 1940’s somethine or rather.

Anyhow, people are always asking to see the footwear I design. And I would show you more footwear-related design, but as you might imagine I have been under strict contract to protect the proprietary design I do for the company I work(ed) for, and this is the dilemma. We work on footwear for upcoming seasons, and really it would be questionable for me to post any of these designs before they are produced, which is sometimes half a year to a year later. So let’s say a shoe that I design makes it all the way to retail. Well it’s a long road to it’s production. And that little shoe sometimes has a short lifespan (1/2 the time it doesn’t even make it all the way to production for a number of reasons.) The process is something like this; First, a protoype is made, usually in one color/material, then the shoe is fit tested and visually corrected at the factory by our fit technicians and fit test model (yes, there are perfect size 6 feet getting paid to try on shoes all day) and sometimes design also visually corrects the prototype here in the design office. Based off of our corrections on that prototype, a pair of samples are then made in a variety of colors and materials. Then we “merchandise” the line and drop what didn’t execute well, and maybe add some things based on what is working. We shuffle things around and refine the line. Then we take our samples to a big shoe show and buyers can purchase the shoes to retail in their stores. We often design almost twice the amount of shoes that actually make it to production. Half of this, sometimes more, is dropped along the way, either because the factory cannot make it to look as it should, the pricing is too high on the components, it doesn’t merchandise or fit well with the rest of the line, or simply, we find something more relevant to take it’s place.

So here’s the dilemma. First, the designs I design aren’t technically or legally”mine” to show. Second, they could be copied before they even hit retail if I were to divulge design details. But I always work on things paralelling what I am doing on work, so I can reveal my interpretation of things, that I did outside of work, which holds no liability. Like the anchor outsole design! It’s mine! All mine!

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