A shoemaker's hands stitch the upper of a shoe mounted on its wooden last, a hammer and a small jar of wax alongside.

Handmade objects and craftsmanship

Artisan Shoemaking

A shoe made by hand is a small anatomical marvel. The foot that will wear it is unique, asymmetrical, alive; the last in wood or resin on which the shoe is built has to correspond to it. This is why the true artisan shoemaker looks at the feet first of all, measures them, touches them, takes their impressions. The last — that wooden object which reproduces the foot — is the first gesture of the craft, and already contains half the work.

A paved alley and the open door of a workshop, shelves inside crowded with shoes and wooden lasts.

Where

Where it is practised in Tuscany

In Tuscany artisan shoemaking has its own geographies. Firenze has an illustrious school — bespoke shoemaking, an inheritance of the tradition that crosses the twentieth century and reaches workshops still active — oriented towards the individual client, towards the gentleman who wants the classic English model, towards the international visitor who goes home with a commission. Then there is the footwear district of Lamporecchio and Monsummano: here shoemaking is also small and medium industry, making shoes for the great Italian and French labels and keeping the know-how of clicking, lasting and Goodyear and Blake stitched construction.

Two wooden shoe lasts on the bench with a roll of leather, twine, a jar of black wax, scissors, an awl and a hammer.

How

The techniques of the craft

The techniques of the craft are numerous and each of them defines a type of shoe. Clicking the upper is the cutting of the leather; lasting is the delicate moment in which the leather is stretched and fixed onto the wooden last with tacks; Goodyear stitching joins upper, insole and sole with a double stitch that allows the shoe to be resoled many times; Blake stitching is slimmer and suited to light shoes; hand stitching — ever rarer — is the mark of shoemaking of the highest order. The leathers are worked according to their origin (vacchetta, calf, cordovan, kid), dyed by hand and polished with waxes and creams that are sometimes family recipes.

Shelves and benches lined with rows of wooden lasts, and at the far end a craftsman bent over his workbench among hanging tools.

Now

The craft today

Doing it today means measuring up to a market that has almost forgotten what a hand-stitched shoe is. Industrial production has standardised the foot and cut prices to levels that cannot be matched. But precisely for that reason artisan shoemaking has found a segment of its own: the client who is looking for durability measured in decades, comfort built around their own anatomy, restoration and resoling as a constant practice. The real workshops often work for international niches, keep apprentices and recover old techniques.