Join me for a group shoe making session at a beautiful studio at Tannery Bend, on the Napa River! This class is specifically geared toward making mules. Mules are slides with a closed toe and open heel. They’re casual, chic, and fairly simple to make. My technique for making these is relatively quick compared to more traditional methods: We basically use a last (shoe form) to form the toe shapes and then make adjustments for fit. It’s an easy enough process to replicate at home with a few small investments and no machinery.

During our 2 days together, we'll spend about 8-hrs designing, cutting, fitting, and building a pair of mules for your own feet. There are many variables to play with including material, toe shape, heel height, and color.

Day 1: designing, selecting lasts, making up patterns, choosing leather colors and textures, lining leathers, dying leather, shaping soles, shaping uppers, stacking heels, etc. Day 2: fitting uppers, scratching and gluing, midsoles or skiving, attaching heel/soles, edge finishing, nailing, adding laces and hardware.

Once you sign up, I’ll be in touch with you about what shoe size you are, and what toe shape you prefer (round, oval, pointy, square).

Workshop hours are about 4 hours one day and 4 hours the following day. 10am-2:30pm each day with a short break for lunch snacks.

Making your own shoes can be an incredibly gratifying learning experience. I hope you can join me!

*Note: You may want to wear or bring easy on/off footwear for our day of working with your feet. You’ll be thankful you did! Also, if you require eye-glasses for seeing up-close, these can be handy to remember to bring because we will be doing some precision cutting.