Holly Henry on the Cowboy Bootmaking Community's Sustaining Power (Also: Saddles)
I will tell anyone who dares listen that handmade bootmaking—and perhaps specifically, cowboy bootmaking—is the highest form of leatherwork as functional art. And then I started paying attention a bit...
11 Dec 20241h 5min
Aki Choklat on Building a Shoemaking College Program From Scratch
In the US, there are schools for everything—of course you can study business, or to become a doctor. But also if you want to be an electrician, or an airplane mechanic—someone can teach you that. And ...
4 Dec 202444min
Vintage King Brian Davis of Wooden Sleepers on Why Everything We Buy Sucks These Days
Often, vintage clothing and footwear's defining quality IS quality. As in, its actual construction and materials, how well it was made, way back when. In most cases, it wouldn’t even be here today if ...
26 Nov 20241h 28min
Brett Viberg is Back on the Shoecast, and He's Bringing Loafers
15 years ago Viberg was pretty firmly Canada’s most hardcore logging and industrial boot company. Since Brett Viberg took over the reins of the nearly 100-year-old brand from his father Glen, Viberg h...
19 Nov 20241h 27min
Brian The Bootmaker May Actually Be Mister Rogers
To be honest I didn’t think I’d ever get Brian the Bootmaker on this show—he doesn’t do many interviews at all, and for whatever reason I was, quite frankly, kind of afraid to ask him. Which in hindsi...
2 Okt 20241h 20min
Molly Monahan, The Motorcycle Mechanic Turned Garlic Farmer Turned Small-Town Cobbler
When you grow up in a shoe repair shop directly next door to your actual house, it's hard to not catch the cobbling bug. But oh did Molly Monahan try to resist. After learning how to repair motorcyc...
10 Sep 202451min
Jess Wootten on Making Boots in an Australian Gold Rush Town, and Blake Rapid Misconceptions
This episode's chat is with Jess Wootten of…Wootten! The Ballarat, Australia boots and shoes and leathergoods maker that is doing some very interesting work. We covered how Jess somewhat tripped int...
4 Sep 202451min
Caswell's Kevin Wilson on How to Start a One-Man Boot Brand—and Bringing Back US Manufacturing
“The only way I learned was making many mistakes and losing a shit ton of money in the process” is how Kevin Wilson neatly sums up the never-simple process of getting Caswell Boot Company off the grou...
14 Aug 202458min
