Making wooden shoes is a tough job, especially in the early days when there were no machines to support the process. When a wooden shoe maker did his best and worked real hard he could complete 1 pair wooden shoes in 2 hours. So with working days of 14 hours (that was a normal working day) a wooden shoe maker could complete 7 pair wooden shoes in one day.
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1
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The trunk is saw into "bollen" (slices). The thickness of the slice depends on what size wooden shoe a wooden shoe maker wants to make.
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2
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The slices are cleaved on a chopping-block with an chopping axe. The final result are triangle shaped wood pieces.
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3
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The wood pieces are cut into shape with special axes and knifes. The outside now will get the (raw) shape of a wooden shoe.
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4
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The wooden shoe will be placed into a special work bench, then the inside will be bore out with spoon shaped wood drills.
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5
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The inside will be improved with three other special knifes: A knife for the bottom, a knife for the heel and a knife for the rounded parts. |
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The outside will also be improved with different knifes: the stock knife and the grip knife.
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7
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The wooden shoes will be dried. From the 50% moisture in the wood will be around 10% left after the drying.
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8
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Once dry the wooden shoes will be totaly sanded by hand.
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9
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Most wooden shoes are vernished or painted. Eventualy those woodens shoes also get a decoration.
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When you use the menu item "Links" you will go to the weblink page. Here you can find the webadresses from wooden shoe makers which are giving live demonstrations wooden shoe making by hand.