l've also managed to locate a square awl from overseas, so now John will be able to do really fine stitching on my soles to hopefully 10 - 12 spi like the big boys at G&G and other places. Bloody excited about it too. lt's GAME ON now folks, big things are about to happen, things are gonna be HUGE!.. John is going to grow 10 feet tall, beat his big mighty chest and smack this rascal right out of the ballpark for a big fat home run. He is going to become the biggest legend since the legendary George Keoff, and he is going to come home to rousing applause with hundreds of people cheering him on and yelling his name.

Late edit: John is gonna stitch those bastards like he's never stitched in his life, and i'm gonna sit next to him and hand stitch the soles of fhx's Florsheim lmperial gunboats. We're gonna stitch, and stitch, and then stitch some more. There's gonna be ALOT of stitching going on in that household, and we're the two blokes who are gonna be doing it. We're gonna stitch like it's going out of fashion...we're gonna stitch to the bleedin' cows come home...we're gonna stitch like no tomorrow. We're going to keep in stitchin' `til we run out of leather, and we're gonna stitch `til we can't do it no more.

Three months later l am still at John's stitching away. And three months after that all the Church's shoos in the shops have hand stitched soles. People will ask...why have all the Church's shoos in Melbourne got hand stitched soles, and blokes will say..because The Shooman wanted them that way.

Last edited by The_Shooman (2012-03-06 07:41:20)

Last edited by The_Shooman (2012-03-08 23:55:13)

Can't you just saw a V wedge in them?

I cant see why a V wedge wont work, after all wasn't that the old method?

Last edited by The_Shooman (2012-03-22 23:49:02)

Last edited by The_Shooman (2012-03-23 01:58:40)

Shooey, if the last was soo hard to get out then your foot may never be able to be got out.

lf you look at the toe cap you will notice that the pattern has been cut so it forms an up-side-down smile on the last, that is done on purpose, because when l wear them that up-side-down smile will become straight. Many inexperienced makers and pattern makers would make it look straight on the last, but this cause a problem because the toe cap would end up sagging and putting strain in the cap area and it would end up tearing over time.

l was stunned when John told me that Mr X actually made a few mistakes in the drawing up of the pattern. Not only was there not enough space to originally space the broguing along the top of the shoe along the ankle area at a good distance over the heal counter area, but there was not enough space for the depth of the shoe at the toe area. Still, mistakes can happen, but the pattern was very complexly drawn for sure...lots of little details that most folks wouldn't even think about.