ErasmusSchoen Schoen Erasmus By Michael Grover
A shoe for a waterlogged world
Erasmus Schoen By Michael Grover
A shoe for a waterlogged world
My name is Michael Grover. I’m in my fourth and final year of Graphic Design studies at the Rhode Island School of Design. During the month of January, I enrolled in a four week shoe design course in Germany and The Netherlands. Why would a graphic designer want to learn how to make shoes? When I was young, my grandparents tell me that my greatgreat-great-grandfather invented the left and right shoe. Though the accuracy of this claim is dubious, I’ve been interested in shoes ever since. Making my very own shoe has been a goal for a while, but always far in the back of my mind. When I heard about this class, I leapt at the chance to learn how to make shoes. This book details the making of my
NORTHERN EUROPE: SHOE DESIGN APPAR-3057-01 Kathleen S. Grevers Using the creative cultures of Germany, Netherlands and Belgium, students will use the experience of footwear design as a way to more deeply understand and expand their own personal design process. This course will inform through the practice of creative introspections inspired by Da Vinci’s methods as well as from Northern European history, design practice and cultural aesthetic. There will be a series studio and factory visits within a variety of design fields supported by museum and gallery visits. Students will also use their sketchbooks as visual and reflective journals to practice insightful daily exercises to advance their design process and footwear designs. During the visit to Northern Europe we will have three presentations, to share cultural explorations, process development and the progress of shoe designs. The final shoe design will represent the influence of these explorations, and the manifestation of an expanded design methodology. Permission of instructor required
The course’s description on the Rhode Island School of Design course catalog.
My application letter to Kathleen Grevers, and her response.
Concept Before creating the shoe, I spent two weeks in Germany with the express purpose of finding inspiration. One week in Berlin studying fashion, and one week in Munich studying automotive design. While being saturated by culture and inspiration, I made sketches and concepts for the final shoe I would create.
A week before beginning our shoe, the class was tasked with creating collages out of material we collected during our time in Germany. After making the collages, we then sketched them as shoes.
Sketches done during dinner in Rotterdam, Netherlands, after I saw the inspiring Erasmusbrug, or Erasmus Bridge.
An early idea that was an important stepping stone towards my final shoe concept.
This collage, done digitally, was where I discovered the design of my shoe. The calf is covered in car parts from the BMW museum, and the front of the leg and foot are enveloped by the Erasmusbrug.
Leather We experimented with leather finishes at Stahl, a leather chemical supplier, for three days.
Chosen leather Every day at Stahl, we were allowed to choose one sample of leather to take and use for our shoe.
Every day at Stahl, we were allowed to choose one sample of leather to take and use for our shoe. This is the first piece I chose, and it ultimately became part of my shoe.
The second piece I chose was this goat fur. I considered using it as a linging around the top of my shoe, but ultimately decided it was too much. This fur currently holds an honored position on the back of my chair.
On the third day I chose this relatively generic looking piece of leather. While making the leather, we did not know what our shoe would look like. I chose this leather to ensure I would have a neutral color of leather to unify the shoe if necessary. On the final day I chose this green piece of leather. It became useful in my shoe design as material for cutting practice pieces.
My leather For three days we were given free reign in Stahl’s leather lab to paint and emboss as much leather as we wanted.
This is the first piece of leather I treated at Stahl. I made it by taking a yellow crust and giving it an even coat of light green paint. Then, I folded the leather like an accordian and sprayed a darker green coat onto the leather, creating a striped pattern. For this piece, I splattered layers of paint onto a piece of leather while thinking of music and dancing.
The effect I achieved on this piece was inspired by a mistake. I accidentally spilled some paint onto the leather, and sprayed it with compressed air. This created a dripping effect. I repeated this effect across the canvas.
On the final day I chose this green piece of leather. It became useful in my shoe design as material for cutting practice pieces.
Left: I created a collage using all of the leather that I had to work with to see how the pieces would interact together. Below: This is a version of my previous shoe collage using swatches of my leather to get a better idea of what my final shoe will look like.
Shoes For our final week of the trip, we made our prototype shoe at SLEM, a shoe design school in Waalwijk, Netherlands.
In preperation for making our final shoe, we made a pair of shoes over the course of a single day.
We spent four and a half days making our final shoe. It happens to work as a hat too.
I call my final shoe the Erasmus Schoen. I made it in anticipation of rising sea levels, so that the wearer can use it comfortably while walking through water up to one foot deep. It is aerodynamic like a fin to push the water smoothly around the foot as it steps. One day in the near future, our shoes will look not so different from the Erasmus Schoen.
“Why you closin’ doors?” —Proprietor of Denham store