Renewed y Resoled
In 2013, I was a footwear designer for the Sebago brand within Wolverine Worldwide, whose corporate portfolio included brands like Merrell, Saucony, Chaco Footwear, Sperry, Cat Footwear, Bates Footwear, and others. At the time, Bates Footwear was the U.S. military’s largest boot supplier and had a factory located an hour North in Big Rapids, Michigan.
In addition to being a 9-to-5 footwear designer, I was also the Creative Director for the nonprofit organization I co-founded in 2010, [HAS HEART]. Every year, we’d partner five veterans with five designers for a multi-day collaborative design process that would yield a meaningful graphic design that shared each veteran’s story. Our annual HERO[series] projects would be curated into ArtPrize exhibits featuring a coinciding pop-up shop of their designs produced into American-made consumer products such as t-shirts, decals, and more.
Bates Footwear played a role in the first few years by enabling each veteran to design their own 1-of-1 combat boot that would be displayed alongside their t-shirt design. These were customized by a factory in China and weren’t available for the public to purchase.
For the 2014 project, I pitched the idea to create a Limited Edition collaborative Bates x [HAS HEART] boot that merged their military dress oxford shoes with their military combat boots 100% sourced and made in the USA. We worked with the Bates design and development teams and the five wounded veterans to embed meaning into the materials and design details.
We requested blank, recycled cardboard shoe boxes that I took to a designer friend, Nick Stockton, to screenprint the meaningful detail call-outs of the boots onto the boxtop that will not only help share the story behind the boot, but also act as a daily reminder to those lacing up these special edition boots.
Photo by Adam Bird
Of all the dozens, if not hundreds, of shoes and products I’ve designed over the years, these boots have always been my favorite because of the meaning and process behind them. For years throughout the Fall and Winter months in Michigan, I wore them more than any other pair of shoes I owned (which was 100+ at the time).
I even wore them to Nike’s global HQ inside Phil Knight’s office when I was delivering the pointillism painting he commission me to do for LeBron and Savannah James as their wedding gift. It was a surreal moment as both Phil and I were presenting the artwork to LeBron — while I was wearing these boots.
Over the past 8+ years, I’ve worn these boots so often, the outsole started to wear. So, being that they were constructed with a Goodyear Welt, I knew they could easily be resoled. I took them into Sam at his Cascade Shoe Repair shop to bring them back to life with a new wedge Vibram outsole.
This process of reviving my boots has re-energized the opportunity we all have to take better care of the items we own.
Not only that, but it also should play a vital role in our future purchasing decisions to buy products that we love and would be willing to take care of for years to come.
Before this could happen from the consumer side, it’s up to the brands and their product designers and developers to create quality products that are built to last.
Rant over.
