Day Seven, Oklahoma State Boots

Posted on October 27, 2022 by customboots

Today I’ll share the photos of how the boots were built so you can learn a little about cowboy boot construction.

When you look down at a cowboy boot and see stitching going around the toe, that stitching is not on the top of the sole. A narrow strip of leather called Welt is hand-stitched through the boot and also the insole. After the sole is added it’s stitched onto the welt, and this is the visible stitching you see. The Welt stitches, if they’re done properly, are completely invisible but they’re very important, as they’re what holds the top of the boot to the bottom. The metal shank is laced into the arch area with the excess threads from sewing the welt.
A cowboy boot traditionally has a rounded shank area, so I’ve covered the laced shank with a heavy piece of leather called a Shank Cover, and then rounded and smoothed it to provide a nice surface for gluing on the sole. 
The soles are added to the boots, stitched, and pegged with a double row of little wooden pegs. The pegs help hold the sole securely to the boot in the arch area and also strengthen and reinforce the arch area.
Here you can see the stitched that goes around the toe, which is on top of the welt but also through the sole. The bottom of the sole is grooved with a channel, the stitches fall into the channel, and then the channel is closed back over the stitches to protect and hide them.
The heels are built from sole leather, one layer at a time, each layer is leveled and another added, until the correct heel height is reached.
The final step is treeing the boots overnight to reinforce their shape. 
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Day Six, Oklahoma State Boots

Posted on October 26, 2022 by customboots

Day Six: the making of the Oklahoma Boots, which are now part of the Oklahoma State Capitol permanent art collection

It felt really good to last the Oklahoma boots and see them finally begin to look like an actual pair of boots, but it only took a brief moment for this day turned sad and stressful.

Before I continue that story, I’d like to point out another special little design detail. See the state of Oklahoma? The stitched line across it represents the line separating Indian Territory on the east side and Oklahoma Territory on the west side. Guthrie, the town where I live, was the capital of Oklahoma Territory and was designated the official capital when Oklahoma became a state in 1907. Guthrie remained the capital of Oklahoma until 1911 when the state seal was taken from the Logan County courthouse and delivered to Oklahoma City. This is why there are two stars on the map of Oklahoma; the smaller star represents Guthrie, the original capital, and the larger star represents Oklahoma City, the capital since 1911. 

After lasting the boots I wiped in the toe — the process that neatly smooths out all the excess leather in the toe area. I wiped the toe of the second boot, sat it down on my bench, turned away, and heard a THUNK as it fell off the bench and hit the floor. It fell directly onto the sharp corner of the toe and split the wingtip open. 
The leather I’d used for the wing and countertips was a piece I’d been saving for several years. I loved the color and the texture, and it was no longer available, but I decided this was a special enough project to warrant using it. My first thought was sheer panic because as I remembered it, I’d used up all of it. I went and dug into my scrap box and found (to my relief!!!) that I had one small scrap left exactly big enough to make one more wingtip. The boot fell off and split the toe open at 10am; I spent the rest of the day taking the boot off the last, carefully picking out the stitches and removing the damaged wingtip, making a whole new wingtip, carefully sewing it onto the boot in precisely the same place so no stitch holes would show, and lasting the boot again. I remember sitting down at 5:38pm with a huge sigh of relief to be back where I’d started at 10am. 
Two boots! With two undamaged toes! For as long as these boots were in my shop after this, I remained terrified of dropping them. When I delivered the boots to the Capitol, I told them this story and specifically noted with great relief that they were no longer my responsibility.
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Day Five, Oklahoma State Boots

Posted on October 25, 2022 by customboots

Day Five: the making of the Oklahoma Boots, which are now part of the Oklahoma State Capitol permanent art collection

At this point in the process all of the decorative work is done and each piece is completed; now it’s time to begin putting all the pieces together.

Making a pair of one-piece top boots with  a single seam up the back is a challenge. Here I’ve sewn the vamp tongue onto the boot top; this concludes the easy part of the construction.     
The challenge begins once the back seam is sewn — from this point forward I’m working with a tube shape. The absolute hardest part is sewing the thick, heavy, flat counter (heel reinforcement) into the boot. It’s done in this photo and you can be sure I was breathing a sigh of relief at this point.
That center back seam can be an ugly eyesore and it’s typically covered with a simple strap of leather. I decided to use it as an opportunity for another design detail, so the back strap is an intricately inlaid and stitched oil well. The Oklahoma State Capitol building is the only capitol in the world that sits over an oil well and the only US capitol with active oil rigs on the property.
The most common question about these boots is, “What size are they?” There are two answers: One, they’re a size 10B. And two, no, you won’t ever get to wear them. 
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Day Four, Oklahoma State Boots

Posted on October 24, 2022 by customboots

Day Four: the making of the Oklahoma Boots, which are now part of the Oklahoma State Capitol permanent art collection

Today I’m going to talk a little bit about the wing and counter tips and their design inspiration.

The countertip is the design part that goes on the heel area; it features the first line of Oklahoma’s official gospel song “Swing Low, Sweet Chariot.” This song was written by Wallace Willis, an enslaved Oklahoma man. There were dreams of Oklahoma becoming an all-Black state — a place to be free and own land and escape the shattered dreams of Reconstruction in the south. Oklahoma has many historically Black towns and is also home to Langston University, a historically Black college that opened in 1897. The counter tip is in memory of the many Black Oklahomans who sought freedom here.

The wingtip is the decorative part over the toe. A traditional boot making technique is a line of little round holes along an edge; these are called perforations. If you look closely you’ll see that the perforations on the wingtip are teardrops. This is in memory of the Trail of Tears, the forced removal of over 60,000 Native Americans from their homes to Indian Territory, which is now Oklahoma. The teardrops honor the ones who died on these marches, and the ones who survived.

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Day Three, Oklahoma State Boots

Posted on October 21, 2022 by customboots

Day Three: the making of the Oklahoma Boots, which are now part of the Oklahoma State Capitol permanent art collection
A one-piece boot top is one big panel of leather; the only seam is designed to go up the center back. Stitching lots of tiny details on a one-piece boot top is not too much fun because the piece is too big to fit easily through the throat of a sewing machine, and decorative stitching requires much repositioning of the work. For this reason I did as much of the stitching as possible before sewing it all together.

The Capitol building caused more mental anguish than any other design element. Straight lines are the most difficult to cut accurately and they’re the most difficult to stitch also — any small wobble is noticeable. I had never completely stitched a design element before adding it to a boot top, and I spent considerable time stressing about cutting the hole for this element exactly precisely the correct size and shape so it would fit perfectly around the stitching.
I also inlaid and stitched the Oklahoma flag before putting it into the boot top. The shape of the flag was easier but I wasn’t really confident I could do this much detail (and letters!) at this size. The day I successfully completed the Oklahoma flag was a good day.
On the other hand, that sweet little scissor tail bird was a joy to create, and makes me happy every time I look at it. I’m going to create a framed art piece of the scissor tail on a redbud branch just so I get to make this part of the design again.
And just like that, the boot tops are completed! At this point I moved on to worrying about sewing that back seam — there’s a point with one-piece tops where you’re trying to sew things onto a tube shape and it’s not always easy.
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Day Two, Oklahoma Boots

Posted on October 20, 2022 by customboots

Day Two: the making of the Oklahoma Boots which are now part of the Oklahoma State Capitol permanent art collection

The Oklahoma boots have a one-piece top; instead of a seam up each side of the boot there’s a single seam in the center back. Omitting the side seam provides two large areas for design. With a normal side seam construction, the area for design is kind of an H shape because the top dips down and the tongue reaches up, narrowing the center design space. Squeezing the Capitol or the flag into the space between the top band and the tongue would have been difficult.

Original design sketch for the Oklahoma State boots. The red tail hawk feather was replaced by a frog on the actual boots.
This is what an actual design pattern looks like. I’ve stitched the design into the poster board with no thread in the needle, to create little holes for the pattern markings.
The very first part of the boots I did in leather were the top bands so this was an exciting day!
Many boot makers break off a needle and sharpen it like a little blade, then use their sewing machine to cut out inlay holes. It works well and I’ve done it that way, but I prefer to cut out each part of the design by hand with an X-Acto knife. It’s fun to see how precise I can be, and then exactly again only reversed.
I cut paper pattern pieces for *every* part of the design. That way I can accurately do the exact same thing for the right and left boot.
It’s always so fun to put little oddly-shaped bits of leather together, turn the piece over, and see a frog! Or a bison, or a bumblebee!
Putting in the inlay pieces is exciting, but it’s the stitching that truly brings it to life.
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Oklahoma Boots, part one: Wingtips, countertips, and back strap

Posted on October 19, 2022 by customboots

The time has arrived and I can finally share pictures of the Oklahoma boots!

I’ll start with the design sketches I sent to the Oklahoma Arts Council for approval and how those sketches went from paper to leather. These are the sketches for the wingtip, countertip (heel decoration), and decorative strap to cover the back seam.

I’ll post more about the design and the significance of small details when I reveal the completed boots.

Sketch for wingtip, countertip, and back strap
Cut wingtip, completed oil derrick back strap
Top left: poster board pattern for wingtip, bottom left: inlaid (but not stitched) wingtip, bottom right: finished wingtip with stitching details, teardrop edge design, and secondary border

Completed wing and countertips on vamps (foot part) and counter covers (heel part)
Vamps with wingtips and counter covers with countertips, with all my tools
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Sunflower Bracelet

Posted on September 7, 2022 by customboots

Title: :”Somewhere in Kansas”

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When My Blue Moon Turns to Gold Again

Posted on September 1, 2022 by customboots

Most of my clients would choose something from my portfolio and change it up a bit if they had ideas, but I had one customer that always wanted to give me some ideas and have me design something completely new just for her. She and her husband commissioned several pairs of boots and I used to be apprehensive about her orders every time — she was LOVELY, but I felt very inadequate as an artist and designing something new on demand scared me. Looking back now, I appreciate how she forced me out of my comfort zone. This pair of boots is an excellent example of how, with her encouragement and support, I surprised myself sometimes!

Title: “When My Blue Moon Turns to Gold Again”

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Oklahoma Boots update

Posted on August 30, 2022 by customboots

The Oklahoma boots are finished and I’ll deliver them today. I am so eager to share the photos with you! Until I have permission, I’ll just share the photo of the card I include with all my boots.

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