Making The Boots

My plan

The boots were more challenging than what I first thought they would be, the basic shape was easy to make but fabricating the boots was difficult.

Basic Boots Shape

I started by finding dimensions for the boots and finding a good reference image to work from. I used chicken wire to make the basic shape and covered that in bubble wrap and parcel tape to make it more secure and easy to shape. Obviously I had to make two, one thing I found quite difficult was getting the boots to look the same and this took a while to do and there are still small differences in the shapes, but they are not really noticeable.

To fabricate the boots I used a mixture of materials to highlight certain areas and add details. Again I used traditionally feminine materials and methods, which were also popular in the Wartime era this was mainly knitting, crochet and floral fabric. I also wanted to incorporate the make do and mend idea by using the different floral fabrics sewn together in a patchwork style. To work put what fabric I wanted to use where, I used the image as a reference to follow the seams and drew those on to the boots and decided that I wanted the floral fabric as the main body of the boot but changing the pattern at the seams. The knitting was used as the material to highlight detail, so I used that at the heel of the boot and as the lining. I initially intended it to be used over the toes of the boots but after covering it with a test piece it made it look too thick so I used the floral fabric for it. I emphasised the seams using a thin white lace and I think that this detail made the boot look more true to the original design as the seams were more exaggerated which makes the shape look more realistic.

The tongue and the lace area of boots make boot most recognisable as boots so this is where I wanted to put extra detail to draw attention to it. What I did to do this was to consider the most feminine materials I could use to really emphasis this section. I used a lilac coloured ribbon as the laces for the boots, I chose this as ribbon is mostly used on women’s clothing and the colour is also commonly associated with femininity. As the eyelets I used a crochet pattern that had holes in along it, this gave me somewhere to thread the ribbon through but looked more feminine than just having eyelets. As well as this the crochet also utilised a skill that was used in the war by women. The last main area of detail in this section was the tongue of the boots, the main body of which I made from the same wool as the lining of the boot for continuity but on the front I used white lace that contrasted against the lilac ribbon. I thought that this added a new type of texture in to the boot and helps focus your immediate attention to this area.

The next section I worked on was the soles of the boots, which I wanted to create from resin with flowers placed inside. This was to partially give a solid base to the boot but the flower were what I found interesting to add.  One thing I really thought about when I was designing this section was the fact that the sole of the boot was what the soldiers walked on and what they went through during the war. I wanted to use the flowers as a way to blend the femininity of the flowers with the masculine nature of what they had to do in regards to using the resin type substance on the aircrafts.

         To make the soles I firstly created a wooden version using a template I made from the boots. This was then vacuum formed and the first layer of resin was poured in to it. Once the first layer had partially dried I used a mixture of foam roses and real flowers and added the rest of the resin, which was left to dry. What I noticed with the real flowers was that the colour was changed quite a lot, the original colour was purple, but in the resin they are white. This isn’t an issue for me in this project as the colour of the flowers is not important, however doing this has made me aware that this does happen and to be cautious of colour loss/change if it is important to the finish of the project. 

Basic Template

Wooden Version

Vacuum Formed

Resin Cast with flowers

          When the soles were  removed from the mould I realised that the template may have been to large for the boots, this led to me having to cut down the excess using saws and files to get the larger parts off. This gave the edges a rough finish so I used varying harshness of wet and dry sandpaper to smooth them out and I am happy with the way they ended up, even if it was more longwinded than just making sure the template was right in the first place. So in future I need to be much more accurate with making template for resin as when I was cutting in to the soles I was very aware of how brittle the material is and that if it cracked it could completely shatter.

Area that needed to be trimmed

So all I needed to do after that was fix it all together, the soles are heavy so need to be fixed on securely. My solution was to use a hot glue gun on the larger areas. The other thing I did was to add a crochet lining around the sole where it met the boot, not only did this re-enforce the fix but also added a nice finishing detail. To do this section I glued the crochet on to the resin sole and then sewed that on to the fabric of the boot.

Glued on the sole

I am pleased with the outcome of the boots, I particularly like the soles because they add a mixture of texture and material in to the object and I think the symbolism of the flowers in the soles is subtle but effective. One thing I am not too happy with is the attachment of the wool at the heel of the boots where some glue can be seen, but I have tried to trim this out for a better finish. What I would like to do if I started this again is think of how I can this so it is a new functional product than a warped interpretation of an old one. One thing I considered doing was turning them in to speakers for the show, so I could play wartime songs and radio broadcasts through them just to add more ambience around my piece. I don’t think I will do this as I can’t get wireless speakers and I don’t want wires hanging out from the boots if they are supposed to be from the wartime as I think that would look out of place though if I get time and find a way around this I may do it as I have seen a book about making knitted headphone wire covers which would be ideal.