Dubai: Bespoke shoes are nothing new. But a luxury footwear company claims that for the first time in the UAE, women can design and order customised handmade shoes using an online 3D shoe designer.
Sau Noddings, co-founder of Shoenvious which began taking orders last month, told XPRESS the platform was the result of a personal experience.
She said, “When I got married, I ordered my wedding dress online. But I had a difficult time trying to find the right shoes on the Net. That’s how the idea of Shoenvious came about.”
She said besides the 3D advantage, Shoenvious lets customers visualise the shoe at every stage of its construction from any angle. “Customers can choose from 15 shoes shapes, 50 designs, nine heels and over 250 material options. The mix-and-match allows for hundreds of thousands of possibilities. Customers can even choose different colours for different panels and ask for inscriptions and personalised messages.”
Different styles
She said, “We have many styles to pick from: pointed front, pointed pumps, pointed T straps, chunky heel, wedge heel, slip-ons, platforms, strappy shoes, round front T straps, high heels, kitten heels, oxfords, pointed flats, loafers and strappy flats.”
Once the shape is decided, the kind of heel and its height have to be specified. The heel options, among others, include stilettos, blocks, wedges, platforms and flats. The heel height can also be tailored to 0-2, 3-4 or 4-5+ inches.
As for the material, customers can choose from leather, patent leather, suede, satin, hair, metallic or imprint and a whole lot of other bases.
“Basically, we want to change the way women shop for shoes by giving them the freedom to create a customised pair with the shoe designer rendering the product in 360 degrees in real time,” said Noddings.
Six weeks
Once the order is finalised, the shoe is delivered within six weeks.
Shoenvious also offers a 100 per cent fit guarantee.
“If for some reason, the shoe you ordered doesn’t fit you right when it is delivered, we will take it back and replace it with the right fit,” said Noddings.
The shoe prices start at Dh1,400.
“Because of our direct-to-consumer model, we are able to eliminate unnecessary markups and redirect traditional retail overhead costs into the quality of our products,” she said.
