Did you know that most of our ivory leather shoes are dyeable and paintable? For those who have been around for awhile, you have likely heard us talk about dyeing and painting leather shoes before. It’s a great way to customize your American Duchess shoes!
Enter the Isabella Venetian Chopines, from our Heroines Collection with Elena Kanagy-Loux. These laser-cut beauties are made in ivory leather, just like the originals we based them on. While the antiques that we looked at specifically for this design were ivory, chopines came in all sorts of colors. As it’s been a while since we played with dye, we thought it high time to demonstrate an Isabella makeover.
Supplies we used:
- Isabella Chopines in ivory
- A protected surface to dye on
- Angelus Deglazer and Leather Preparer (this is what we recommend; other leather deglazers can also be used, just check with the retailer first to make sure it’s the right stuff!)
- Soft and clean cloth for deglazing
- Angelus leather dye (again, this is what we use and recommend, but there are lots of other reliable leather dyes on the market as well)
- Wool dauber (one dauber is included in every box of Angelus dye)
- Painter’s tape or vinyl tape
- Gloves
- Paper towels
- Optional: spray bottle filled with water
- Angelus Lustre Cream (in neutral or a color that matches the dye)
- Angelus Shoe Wax
For this project, we layered red and brick dyes to achieve a rich wine color.
On our dye surface we have layered a plastic drop cloth with some kraft paper. Dyeing is messy work! For this reason we also wore latex gloves.
When dyeing or painting ivory shoes, you will want to cover the spots you want to protect with some good painters tape. The insoles, sole edges, and shoe linings are all places that should be protected. Stuffing the shoes with tissue paper also helps. Dye loves to bleed (as you can see later on on ours). It’s not about perfection, it’s about prevention!
Before dyeing, one must deglaze their shoes. Leather shoes come from the factory with a protective finish on them. Using a soft, clean cloth, we rubbed our chopines with the deglazer to remove this layer. Once thoroughly deglazed and dyed, we used a continuous spray bottle to dampen the leather of the shoes- this helps dye to go on more evenly.
We started with a couple of layers of red dye on our Isabellas. Now, for a note on dyes: Angelus makes both leather dye and suede dye. The Isabellas have a layer of suede underneath the laser-cut lace pattern on the toes. We decided to experiment and see how they would come out just using the leather dye, as opposed to mixing suede and leather dyes on the same project. For this project, we’re satisfied with the result, but if you’re a stickler for the rules, keep this in mind if you decide to dye your own chopines.
Every bottle of Angelus dye comes with a wool dauber, used to spread the dye around. For this project, we used a combination of the wool daubers, a dampened sponge, and a paintbrush for fine details.
After a couple of layers of red dye had been applied, we switched to using the color ‘brick’, to create a richer, darker color. While paint is opaque, dye is transparent. So, when painting shoes, you can mix a custom color. When dyeing shoes, you need to apply layers (we don’t recommend mixing colors together).
Once the dyeing process was complete, we left the Isabellas to dry overnight. After the dye is completely dry, we applied several layers of lustre cream. The deglazer and dye really dehydrates the leather, so it’s important to replace that moisture. We tried as best we could to avoid getting lustre cream on the suede underlay, as this kind of leather isn’t meant to be moisturized.
…and here is the finished result! The wine color is very rich and Renaissance-coded. Something special about dyeing your shoes is that it’s a process where perfectionism can be challenged, and the results are rarely 100%, totally uniform. We are of the opinion that this is actually for the best. The dimension of dye lends to the historical look of a shoe. If you look at antiques, they are rarely completely perfect. If you took a look at our dyed Isabellas up close, you would see that there is a bit of variation in the dye coating. But, this adds visual dimension to the project! If you really need everything to be 100% uniform, leather paint is probably more up your alley.
What do you think of these customized Isabellas, and what color would you be inspired to dye yours?
