Shoemaking facts for kids

Shoemaking is the process of making footwear. Originally, shoes were made one at a time by hand. Traditional handicraft shoemaking has now been overtaken in numbers by industrial mass production, but not necessarily in quality. Shoemakers may produce a range of footwear items, including shoes, boots, sandals, clogs and moccasins. Such items are generally made of leather, wood, rubber, plastic, jute or other plant material.

A cordwainer is a shoemaker who makes very fine soft leather shoes. A cobbler is someone who repairs shoes.

Images for kids

Woodcut of shoemakers from 1568.
A cordwainer making shoes, in Capri, Italy.
Roadside cobblers, Rekong Peo, Himachal Pradesh, India.
Roadside Lady Cobbler, in front of Kalighat Metro station gate, Kolkata, India.
Early shoemaking shop on exhibit at Maine State Museum in Augusta, Maine.
A shoemaker in the Georgian era, from The Book of English Trades, 1821.
By the late 19th century, the shoemaking industry had migrated to the factory and was increasingly mechanized. Pictured, the bottoming room of the B. F. Spinney & Co. factory in Lynn, Massachusetts, 1872.
Traditional shoemakers still exist today, shoemaker in Karachi