SHARK BAIT!

I'd posted some time ago about ICON shoes . They're unique in that works of art are printed on leather shoes. They come in mules, boots, ballerina flats, oxfords, loafers.

They even have purses. You can check out their website here. Upon investigating these shoes, I found out they were waaaay out of my budget.
So, I decided to make a fake pair. To the left you see an old pair of navy blue, leather loafers that I have had for some time. These are the ones I plan to convert into Fake ICONS.


These are authentic, used ICON shoes. They were on sale on E-Bay. I don't buy used shoes because they have already been molded by the previous owner.

After viewing various creative shoes on Flickr I decided to do mine a little differently. I chose SCUBA divers and sharks.

On one shoe would be SCUBA divers photographing undersea life.

On the other shoe would be sharks poised to attack the clueless divers.

Since my printer doesn't work, I took my thumb drive with the pictures to Staples. I had the clerk print two laser copies. I wanted two just in case I messed up.

Lucky for me I had Staples Reward points that I used toward the copies and ended up paying only 22 cents. Even without the reward points it wouldn't have been expensive.

The Team
Painter's tape, scissors, acrylic paints, permanent markers, brushes, decoupage glue, old newspapers, water (to rinse brushes), newspaper, laser printed pictures.

1. I started out by taping off the areas of the shoe I didn't want painted.

2. Next, I painted the vamp of the shoe with the blue acrylic paint. This was to simulate water in an ocean.
3. After the blue paint had dried, I placed random lightly colored black paint to give it texture. Then, I dry brushed green paint haphazardly to imitate seaweed. I used a red permanent marker to draw the coral and orange and white paint for the tips of the coral.

4. I cut out the figures from my laser print along with some of the background and began gluing in place using decoupage glue.
I used over six coats of decoupage allowing each to dry between coats. These are the shoes after drying and removing the tape.

5. Here are the finished shoes after being polished to as high a shine as I could get. Click on the picture to enlarge.

I was pleased with the way they turned out. I call it; SHARK BAIT

That's It ***

What Is it with women's love affair with shoes? I've asked before and I ask again.

This is the tale of a post I began back in March. My craft didn't work out but I'd already posted my before picture so I wasn't letting it do to waste.

I saw my first pair of Icon shoes and I was in love. The person I saw wearing them was an older lady with a cane. Hers were oxfords. I'd never seen anything like them before. They're leather shoes painted with works of art. I went to the website and WHEW! the price blew me away. I remembered that she said she'd gotten hers on Ebay. These are a couple of pair that were for sale there. Granted they're less expensive but they've been used. I don't buy used shoes.
They've already been molded to someone else's foot. Check out this black pair. You can see the difference in width from when its orginal owner had them. I decided I was going to experiment on an old pair of loafers I have. PROBLEM 1. I can't draw or paint. After much contemplation I decided I would copy something from the computer. Then have it laser copied at an office supply store. I'd cut it out and decoupage it to the top part (I don't know what it's called) similar to the ones in the pictures above.

At first I wanted a clipart picture of SCUBA divers studying a reef on one shoe. On the other shoe I would place a picture of a school of angry looking sharks, poised to attack. I was unable to use the textbox on my computer to place the sharks. I remember being able to do it with my other software but this wasn't cooperating. Maybe I could cut each shark out individually and glue it on the background scene.

NOT!

Too time consuming and tedious. I would need to choose something else. I surfed the NET for pictures I might want to use. I finally settled on this one by Archibald Motley Jr.

I'm a lover of the Harlem Renaissance. Motley was a painter during that era. While downloading the picture I ran out of color ink. I live a distance from an office supply store so I went to Walgreens where they do refills. I sat in the car and asked the clerk to call me on my cell once the cartridge was refilled. IN about 20 minutes I got the call, went in to get the cartridge and was told it didn't pass the test.

Disappointed I retrieved the cartridge and headed for Wal-Mart. I use Lexmark 16/17 black and 26/27 color. A cartridge usually costs about $26-28. Wal-Mart wanted $41.00 for one cartridge.

I left it there.

Next stop Staples. I didn't want to drive that far but I did. When I got there they didn't have what I needed.

By this time I was pretty pissed off.

So I tabled the project.

When I finally got everything I needed. A brand new, genuine black and color Lexmark cartridge, the printer wouldn't work. I've done everything I know of to get it to work.

Unless something is black everything comes out with an overpowering red tinge.

I don't think this project is going to get done.

THAT'S IT***