Exploring Ancient Feet & Fashions in Samos Museum

September 2025: The Archaeological Museum of Vathy was our last stop in Samos before returning to Türkiye. Looking for inspiration as we venture into designing and making our own minimalist leather footwear. I have become very aware of my own, and observant of peoples' feet and footwear. Seeing the structure of footwear and the shape of feet as represented in these ancient marble figures is one small piece of this slowly evolving minimalist/barefoot journey of learning.

Tanning: An Ancient Craft

One of the main reasons for visiting Samos last year was to see the museum of leather tanning which was set up in the island's original tannery in the town of Karlovasi. We were sad to learn that the tannery ceased production in the early 1970's, after nearly a century of operation, and that there was no longer a leather craft industry on the island. The museum was curated to outline the entire process of leather manufacture using the layout of the tannery and its antique tools and machinery to illustrate. 

Wear Testing Sandals in Ege

A weekend on the beautiful Aegean island of Samos was a great opportunity to give the fresh sandals a proper wear testing. Samos is a small greek island just a short ferry ride from our Turkish HQ near Seferihisar. The island is very beautiful and the terrain just perfect to give the sandals a really robust workout. Rough, steep cobbled roads in the old town situated on a hill overlooking the main harbour and 'off the beaten track' paths through coastal pine forests and clifftop olive groves leading to pristine white pebble beaches.

Feride is wearing the new sample with a single strap which is stitched in place at both ends and loops around the big toe, the mid foot and the ankle. We wanted to keep the design minimal with no buckles or other methods of adjusting the strap length. After wearing a few times the strap had stretched a bit and needed to be shortened a couple of centimetres. After a few more months and another length adjustment we feel that the strap has stretched as much as it is likely to. Next time we will try pre-stretching the leather for the strap before fixing the ends in place.

I am wearing an earlier prototype model I made for myself and have been wearing for nearly two years now. They are both minimalist with very thin and flexible zero drop soles and no arch support. Initially we were wearing them with just the thin leather soles but have now fitted a flexible natural rubber outsole  for greater durability.

Ege Studio 2025

September 2025 - Feride and I were in Türkiye for a month to set up a lovely workroom overlooking the Aegean Sea (Ege). After setting up the work space we ran a week long trial workshop teaching Tuna how to make a pair of pants. We took a pale blue bicycle with us, named the 'Ege Bisiklet', which was great for exploring the local area and hopefully connecting with a local cycling community. The highlight of the cycling aspect of the trip was unofficially and accidentally joining the Izmir Gran Fondo ride around the region. It was beautiful riding with roads closed for the event.

The plan is to visit every year or two, run workshops in the space, enjoy cycling around the area and cooking up Turkish feasts. Feride also set up a couple of lovely bedrooms adjacent to the workroom so that Tuna and his mum Inci could comfortably stay with us for the week.

Finding local suppliers was also on the agenda. Most fruitful was a visit to Izmir for haberdashery supplies and an industrial park dedicated solely to shoe making tools, materials and supplies. After the sewing workshop concluded we spent some time developing a sandal design and made a first sample which Feride is still wearing today and probably for years to come.