Need some special shoes for Halloween, cosplay, or just for wandering down the street every day? Here’s how I made these shoes with a geometric decoration, to dress as a HexaSexual character:
Materials needed:
- Beat-up old shoes that are just barely comfortable enough to wear
- Wide masking tape
- Acrylic paints
- Golden GAC-200 medium
- 1″ flat paintbrush (nylon or taklon)
- Tiny paintbrush (I used 3/0 size)
- Paint palette
- Watertight container
- Marble
- Water for washing brushes
- Cellulose sponge or rag
- Drafting template
- Pencil
- Utility knife
- Cutting mat
- Curling ribbon (gift-wrapping stuff), or coloured shoelaces, fabric ribbon, or yarn
- Scotch tape
- Scissors
This process is going to take a few hours, so start the day before your event:
- Clean the old shoes.
- Remove shoelaces.
- Stick masking tape on any areas you don’t want painted.
- For the background colour (I chose black): Mix acrylic paint with Golden GAC-200 medium, which helps paint adhere to the non-porous surface of the shoes. To easily mix a larger quantity of acrylics, combine them in a watertight container with a marble, and shake it up! About half an ounce of acrylics would have sufficed for my shoes, which needed two coats to cover the original colour. I mixed up a lot of heavy-body black paint, but it would have been easier to use a few drops of the heavily-pigmented Golden Fluid Acrylics.
- Paint the background colour with the larger brush. Use the tiny brush to remove paint from the eyelets, so you can fit the shoelaces in later. I needed two coats to cover the original shoe colour.
- Design your decoration pattern. These instructions are for a geometric motif that requires masking:
- Stick strips of masking tape to the cutting mat.
- Draw shapes on the tape (I used a hexagon template) and cut them with a knife.
- Stick the shapes onto the shoes. You can move them until you like the design.
- Carefully paint an outline colour (white) over the edge of the shape masks (hexagons) using the tiny brush. Golden Fluid Acrylic was the perfect viscosity.
- Remove the shape masks, using the knife tip to lift up the tape.
- Fill in the shapes with paint (I used a purple mixed with white for opacity, then a transparent violet paint).
- Touch up the outlines with white paint.
- I couldn’t find purple shoelaces in a hurry, so I taped some ribbon to the original black laces, then curled the ends with the blade of scissors.
- Pull gently when tying the shoes, or you’ll break the ribbon like I did!
- Pack up your painted shoes and wear something comfortable to get to the party, convention, or other event. You wouldn’t want to get mud on your new creations!
