DIY Tinsel Shoes Tutorial

Do not adjust your screens, these are real shoes people! Firstly, happy new year to you all, hope 2017 is a brilliant one! I set myself a little DIY project before Christmas. Well actually as is the usual way, I thought it all out, then left it for weeks and weeks and last minute decided I should do something about it or the moment would be gone until next year. My background is in fashion, so obviously back then I was extremely creative and it's not something I've been able to indulge in since being ill. In an ideal world, I'd sit and sew and design and craft things all day long, but my brain doesn't work the way it used to and I know I'm not physically up to it either. However, I got this thing in my head that I wanted to make tinsel shoes.
This started with a very long, build-up to falling in love with these Rochas slingbacks. At first glance, I'm pretty sure I considered them ugly. Then once I saw them on people (minus the sporty socks on the catwalk), I was like "wowzers, those are some crazy cool shoes"! They were way outta my price range, even when Yoox taunted me with them 'reasonably' priced recently (still 2-3 times what I'd be able to afford). Then I discovered Jeffrey Campbell had brought out Noel, a nod to the Rochas style with tinsel looking uppers. I'm not sure when they were released, 2015 maybe? They were long gone anyway, so this is when I decided it would be easy to make my own.
I looked for a cheap pair of metallic slingbacks to bling up, but found a pair of nude patent courts instead and knew they'd do. If you didn't already know, Schuh have a section on their website for damaged, imperfect shoes where they are drastically reduced. This is where I found these Missguided nude courts for £6.99, plus I had a 15% off code, so got them for £5.94! A quarter of what they retail for and all because of a mark on the inner side of one shoe. That was the only defect and I knew I'd be covering it, the other shoe was perfect. So I'd already sent Mum out searching for pretty tinsel, the downside of getting an idea like this and being housebound! She brought home a selection from the likes of Poundland, Home Bargains and B&M, all of which were around £1 a strand. I decided on this multi-tonal gold, iridescent one as it was really pretty under the lights and looked awesome against the nude.

Once I played around with the tinsel, I realised I was going to change mine slightly from the Rochas/JC pairs and have a row of tinsel going around the top edge of the shoe, the whole way round. As I was using a court shoe rather than slingback, it lent itself to this. Seeing as I planned on wearing these lightly, I decided rather than faff around with glue, to use extra strong, double sided sticky tape instead.
So I (well actually Mum, because I'd been so busy with Christmas things that my arms had given up on me) taped the top row around the shoe first. Not directly on the edge as I knew it would be a struggle to get my foot into the shoe without folding that layer of tinsel in every time too. Then followed with a further row, just across the front part of the shoe and was also able to get away with another short row to cover the pointed toe. I wanted the front to look really full and fluffy and to be completely covered with no shoe visible and this was definitely what I got.
The tinsel I picked had a nice flat centre (which was lucky) as it made it easy to adhere to the tape and sit flat. We used just under half a strand for one shoe, so had a tiny bit left over from one strand after completing both pairs.
This is the final result. I definitely got my crazy shoes! I thought it might be quite difficult to get my foot into them with all the tinsel sticking up all over the place, but it isn't.  I'm not finding it's tucking itself into the shoe at all.  The mass at the front is just brilliant, completely disguising the shoe to the point you're not even sure if they are real shoes!  It's not until you turn sideways and see the heel that you realise you haven't just stood in a clump of tinsel.    
I wore them for New Year, we didn't have anything major happening, but were having a meal together, so I had time to get dressed up in the afternoon and decided I'd wear these (outfit coming up for Shoesday Tuesday on TSGD later). I know they won't be to everyone's taste, but when I wear stuff like this (and I totally would wear them out, if opportunity knocked), I'm in my element. I truly adore getting to wear the wacky stuff. Life is too short and if you have the balls to do it, just do it. Who cares what anyone else thinks? If you like them, that's all that matters.  I couldn't stop staring at my own feet!

The sticky tape is pretty solid, so I'd guess that the tinsel would wear out long before it became unstuck.  So if you don't have glue to hand, it's no biggy. I definitely want to have a go at a pair of slingbacks next year with just the fronts covered. I got some really interesting silver and pink looped tinsel that's a little more structured looking, which would be awesome.  I'm sure you'd be able to pick up a pair of slingbacks in Primark or somewhere for around a tenner, but I was limited in my choice without getting out to the shops.  Given it's a simple enough craft idea and cost me under £7 for a brand new pair of showstopping shoes, it was worthwhile.  I only wish I'd felt up to doing them myself (more satisfaction that way), but I'm keen to follow up with more shoe customising this year!  What do you think?