Oxford shoes have always been a menswear classic & in the past few years has just been recently revived as a dressy shoe for women as well. You know a shoe is here to stay when you start to see so many variations of it! The oxford or brogue can be seen incarnated as a ballet flat, boot and even as a heel! Right now the trend I’m loving is the colourblocked oxford. Like wingtips in multicolours, neon coloured brogues & contrast soles. Today I’m going to show you how to do a contrast sole on your vintage oxfords so that you can colourblock from head all the way to your toes!
WHAT YOU’LL NEED:
- oxford shoes
- acrylic paint (I used Martha Stewart’s Multi-Surface Satin in Beach Glass)
- paint brush
- masking tape
TUTORIAL:
[ CLEAN ] – Start with cleaning up the surface of your shoes. Mine are a vintage pair & were a bit dusty and dirty from regular wear. Just make sure that they’re free of debris near the sole so that your masking tape will stick!
[ TAPE ] – Carefully tape around the shoe, masking off the leather & leaving only the soles uncovered. We’re using acrylic paint, so you just have to tape off the edge, if you were to use spraypaint, make sure to tape some newspaper to cover the entire surface of the shoe!
[ PAINT ] – Paint on a thin coat of the paint over the entire sole & let the first thin coat dry for an entire hour! Patience! After it’s dry, paint on another thin coat. Making sure that each coat is dry ensures that the paint won’t just peel off when you scratch it.
[ CURE ] – Wait a full 24 hours for the paint to “cure” onto the surface of your soles. The paint I used is supposed to be indoor/outdoor and weather resistant. I did paint the bottom of the soles, which are quite slippery, so I added some stick-on “Outsole Grips” that you can pick up from Aldo Shoes. This adds some much needed grip to the bottoms of the shoes & also prevents the paint from scratching off the part of the sole that you are stepping on :)
[ UNTAPE ] – Carefully remove the tape from the shoe & you’re done!
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Thanks for reading! Are you gonna try this DIY? Tweet us a photo @everybodyisugly
by Sylvia of lipglossandblack
Images by Syl and Sam & from Chictopia
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