# Homemade moccasins



## CamM

I'm kind of known as the shoe guy around here. Recently, however, I sold off my pair of shoe lasts (wood forms for shaping leather) because I wanted to concentrate on simpler, more minimalist shoes. Using this video series I came up with my first moccasins: 
[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R1jiJ4qsdVk[/ame]









The stitching up the front of the one is due to me thinking I could not turn the shoe outside-in without cutting down the center, but on the other one--following the video directions--I managed to turn it. I used artificial sinew for sewing (about 6 dollars for 300 yards). I buy mostly scrap leather. The soles need about 10-16 ounce vegetable tanned leather, and the uppers are ideally 4-5 ounce. The total cost for a pair is probably 10-15 dollars, and you will most likely get multiple pairs from a leather purchase. So far I have jogged several miles in them and it feels like going barefoot, which if you ask me is rather liberating


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## CraterCove

This is awesome. It's one of the reasons I want to learn to tan the hides from my goats and hopefully, eventually rabbits; to make moccasins. I am a Hobbits, by nature, and needing to wear shoes offends me. So I want to learn how to make my own moccasins.

Was it terribly difficult? Besides turning it right side out? Are the instructions in that video fairly easy to follow and get results? What kind of constructive criticism would you give the maker of the video to help someone trying this project for the first time?


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## CamM

Heyo, Crater. I would say the instructions in the video are pretty good from making the pattern to lacing them up. The only problem I had was I snugged up the back of the moccasin against my heel too much, which made the hole too small for my foot to go in (thus the relief cuts you see at the front where the tongue would be). Make the heel looser and let the lacing do the snugging, is probably what I'll do on the next pair. The hardest part is stitching the upper to the sole, and really that's just a matter of some patience and making sure you align the sole and upper fronts before stitching. I forgot to add to make them wear longer it's probably good to add a soling sheet which I got from ebay.

Another thing I may try on my next pair is a saddle stitch rather than a whip stitch. Whip stitching (what they use in the video) leaves gaps between sole and upper so if the ground's at all wet your feet are getting wet right away basically.


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## sand flea

Nice... the video's pretty good information, too. Been wanting to use a piece of white deerhide I've had a long time just for moccasins!


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