One Piece Shoe+Branding
One piece felt shoe design and branding strategy
The one piece shoe project started with creating inspiration boards for the shoes as well as compiling foot measurements.
I drew from athletic motion, very precise matrices of strings, and erosion. I wanted a shoe that would be supportive of activity, have structure through negative space, and resist wear. I took these ideas and created very simple paper shoes that would translate well to one piece construction.
I then started experimenting with the provided felt and figuring out what the best methods for construction would be. I tortured the felt, as I wanted to know how it would perform in wet and hot environments, and since it was synthetic felt, to see how it would weld together.
I used what I learned from exploring one piece construction with paper and translated that to a pattern that I used to create the felt shoes.
The next stage was to create a target audience and a marketing and branding strategy. This flat lay shows what target users would want to have with them while using the shoes. I chose to target the "athleisure" market; affluent, young working professionals who buy athletic gear for style rather than to work out. While these shoes are designed with movement in mind, this branding strategy allows me to approach not only the active community, but also a larger demographic.
The shoes are designed to be shipped as a pattern with everything included to make your own.
Lastly, I created the brand. I was first inspired by the armadillo, as my shoes have a flexible support and also fold into the toe. I wasn't happy with the logo, and I didn't like the negative connotations that come with armadillo, so I dropped a few letters and created DLO.
I also created a poster ad to sell my product and illustrate the "feel" of the brand.
