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Female Speaker: If you're like me, you're always on the look out for the perfect pair of shoes to go with every outfit. Mohop shoes, hand made from sustainably harvested wood do just that. I visited designer Annie Mohaupt in her Chicago affiliate to see first hand how the shoes are made. What was the inspiration behind in creating these very innovative shoes.
Annie Mohaupt: Well I was an architect and spending a lot of time with computer and I just really thought the need to work with my hands. So one day I just decided I could try and make shoes, Its that of being an extraordinary lot of work I was working in my basement at the time like everyday after work like a mad scientist and try you know different shapes and bending wood and cutting it out and eventually I did come across like working shoes, so that was kind of the inspiration. I started selling them at the street fairs, and I say to myself well if they sell on the street fairs then I will start business of it. And as soon as I set them out there is a line out of the door, and I was like,.I have a business .
Female Speaker: It's a winner.
Annie Mohaupt: This is my original style, it's based on actually the idea of a skateboard which is made out of bent plywood. My husband and I just thought it would be fun to make skateboards. And that was kind of my first experience with, working with woodworking tools myself. So we just made skateboards and take tools around - just go with them and so when I thought about making shoes the first thing that came to my mind was a skateboard, because it's made out of plywood and a I thought well, plywood is a great material to use. It's easy, it provides a lot of shock absorption as you want. So that was when I started doing. Plus luckily when I started making the shoes my husband is in, and my house was under construction so we had like a little wood shop in the basement. So I was just like just like go on just play around the tools and stuff. So it was fun it was lot of work that I really enjoyed to coming up with it. And also I was kind of inspired by Charles 0:02:02- who did a lot of work the architects did a lot of work with bent plywood in the 50's. So I just really intrigued by kind of the shapes that could be made with wood and so I bent the wood and attached a heel and the story behind these loops is to be honest when I started making shoes I wasn't exactly, I had no background in shoe making at all. And I was like well how can I make the uppers without having real shoe making equipments and so I just tried to think of a way that the customers maybe could make the shoes themselves and design them and once I started then I was like wow this works great, its so much of fun.
Female Speaker: Yeah.
Annie Mohaupt: It's great for travel because you can, you know bring one pair of shoes, they're really light weight and then just change off the ribbons, I do this everyday and I found that the wood was really comfortable especially with this rubber on the bottom, this is recycled rubber from tires.
Female Speaker: Cool.
Annie Mohaupt: Yeah this is 100% recycled.
Female Speaker: That's beautiful, great and I'm sure it's comfortable, certainly for tires and it 0:03:05-walk around in your shoes.
Annie Mohaupt: And this the wood on these shoes is actually Finnish Birch its made all of Finnish Birch plywood is actually raised on family farms in Finland, so its very eco friendly very sustainable and on the top has different kinds of 0:03:19 and sometimes I put padding on them you know depending on the style.
Female Speaker: You said bent plywood.
Annie Mohaupt: Yeah yeah so I bent the plywood on these.
Female Speaker: Interesting.
Annie Mohaupt: And then cut them out.
Female Speaker: How you bent plywood?
Annie Mohaupt: Well it's kind of -- it's actually kind of a simple process it requires different layers of wood which I glue it together and stick in the mold and I can demonstrate that for you actually.
Female Speaker: Cool, I love to see it. First Annie had to show me her extensive collection of power tools.
Annie Mohaupt: I love these tools.
Female Speaker: Then it was time to make some shoes, she laid out her eco-friendly materials. So this is the plywood?
Annie Mohaupt: This is the plywood, yeah its Finnish Birch. And I put all the parts together and stick them at my mold, the cross frame makes that really strong.
Female Speaker: Really strong.
Annie Mohaupt: Yeah, yeah that's why the skateboards and then you see kids really pounding on them, so and that's because you have all this kind of mutual bentwood that keeps really strong and that's kind of bent plywood used to making shoes that keeps these really dull fit, so I take off these, take off the wood and put it in the molds.
Female Speaker: Okay.
Annie Mohaupt: Clamped on the molds overnight these are heavy, this give me a workout.
Female Speaker: Okay.
Annie Mohaupt: And just just put out the mold, peel off the paper, its just glues into place over night
Female Speaker: Wow. Yeah there is a shoe in there somewhere.
Annie Mohaupt: Exactly. Once I get out the molds I have this sheets that I can set three pairs of shoes across and I determine basically I usually make these to order so I earn my orders, forming at the net height here placed it on the sheets and I know exactly through experience where on the sheet is the most comfortable because you want the ball of the foot needs to be comfortable and where the heel is so you draw the pattern and then it's ready to cut out.
Female Speaker: Then she smooths down the edges with a little sanding.
Annie Mohaupt: We're on the way.
Female Speaker: It's starting to look like a shoe. Wow I can't believe it. It's like so perfect, it's so strong.
Annie Mohaupt: Yeah it's definitely strong, it going to support evidently. Yeah yeah exactly. I have all sorts of different types of people wearing shoes so it's really important that these are sturdy and last forever actually. This is something that I want people to be able to wear for years and years.
Female Speaker: Wow this kind of strength, I think they'll be able to.
Annie Mohaupt: Okay and then and then we just dust it off put some sealer on it environmentally friendly of course attach a heal and little side loops and then we have the shoe.
Female Speaker: If all shoes were made like this.
Annie Mohaupt: Yeah.
Female Speaker: We never have to buy new pair of shoes. They never fall apart.
Annie Mohaupt: Yeah they should hold out forever. And I have done plenty of running for to train in these.
Female Speaker: Really.
Annie Mohaupt: In these? Oh yeah these are great running shoes.
Female Speaker: Annie's other line of shoes the wedge platform sandal is also a best seller.
Annie Mohaupt: This is made out of walnut sustainable sourced from, actually managed forests in --- Pennsylvania, it's another family run business. Basically I order the wood and they got the wood just chop down the tree. But its all you know they have more trees, they're actually planted that are cut down, so it's very stable. This is actually not real suede its a very high-end fold suede thats made out of nylon making it less its like this crazy space age feather, it actually wears better than real suede or real leather.
Female Speaker: Great.
Annie Mohaupt: So --
Female Speaker: And no animals are used?
Annie Mohaupt: No animals, there is no animals, no animal matter in the glue or anything so they are totally 0:07:20. These are newest shoes, user made out of maple with something blue and so this is a great bridal shoe, this is which I put it on my website I maintain orders for brides.
Female Speaker: Because they are probably comfortable when you're walking down the isle or whenever, I mean.
Annie Mohaupt: They are
Female Speaker: They are high so you got the height that suits.
Annie Mohaupt: Yeah they're four inches high.
Female Speaker: Wow.
Annie Mohaupt: But there is, you know there is a platform base, so they're really more like three inches and then we have arch support and padding so they're really comfortable.
Female Speaker: Annie's shoe making process with the wet sandals is similar to the bent ply. She starts with a block of wood, draws the shape and cuts and sands to perfection.
Annie Mohaupt: It's so rewarding to just kind of design something and then make it you know I feel kind of bad for a lot of shoe designers who design something and then they you know send the sketches to Italy and then its three months before they see you know the sample back so for me I love that you know immediate gratification you know I'm having my own shop.
Female Speaker: From design to.
Annie Mohaupt: Yeah. Yeah exactly, it is really fun to do this kind of experiment and see what happens and just draw the sketch and cut things out and sometimes things looks differently and sometimes it's a like great surprise like oh I didn't even realize how it happens sometimes a surprise its fun more often its not.
Female Speaker: Right.
Annie Mohaupt: It gives me another idea, it's all part of the kind of invention process so.
Female Speaker: And the invention process continues when its time to try them on.
Annie Mohaupt: Basic way to lace them up is just like a tachauer, yeah just back and forth however you would like to wear them there is a bunch of loop so like every loop gives you a different permutation and a way to wear it. And you want to tighten them from the toes back and as long as your toes are in there securely all is good.
Female Speaker: Okay. This gives me incentive to want to go polish my toes you know.
Annie Mohaupt: What I do with these you can see that the toe goes up a little bit just bending and redistributes your weight a little back .
Female Speaker: All right so you're kind of sitting.
Annie Mohaupt: Yeah.
Female Speaker: Feel like you're flat versus sitting down.
Annie Mohaupt: Exactly, exactly so you have a lot more of your weight evenly distributed on your heel but there is also support down the whole length of your foot so you're giving support on your mid foot on your the ball of your foot and everywhere.
Female Speaker: They're so comfortable Yeah definitely I feel like my entire foot is super. And best of all each set of shoes comes with five three pairs of ribbon and a guide on dozens of different ways to tie them. So it's true what they say with Mohop you can wear a new pair of shoes everyday.
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Female Speaker: This episode of conscious living is Carbonfree in partnership with Carbonfund.org.
Music Provided by:Julian Abelar.
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