Sole Searching in Bangkok

This weekend I went out looking for new sole sheets for our zero-drop boots.

Fortunately, Bangkok has an entire section of the city dedicated to leatherwork, shoemaking, and bootmaking. It’s not far from Wongwian Yai, and it has become one of my favorite places to wander around when I’m looking for materials, tools, or ideas.

Most of the shops are small, family-owned, independent businesses. There’s also absolutely no guarantee they’ll be open when you show up.

That’s part of the fun.

I make this trip a few times a year, and somehow I always find another little shop I’ve never noticed before.

The best way to explore the area is just to start at the top of the street and walk. I pop into anything that looks interesting. There are shops selling shoemaking tools, stacks of leather scraps, lasts, hardware, adhesives, and pretty much anything else you might need to make a pair of shoes.

And, most importantly for this trip, soles.

Because this is Thailand, there are also about as many places selling food as there are shops selling shoemaking supplies.

My usual technique is to start early in the morning, snack whenever something catches my eye, and then stop for lunch when I find something that looks too good to pass up.

Today, though, the main mission was soles.

I want to improve the sole options we offer on our zero-drop boots. We’re currently talking with several larger sole manufacturers, but they all produce outside Thailand. Once you add international shipping, import duties, and minimum order quantities, the cost starts climbing pretty quickly.

Eventually, that cost gets passed on to the customer.

If we can produce more of our soles here in Thailand, we have much better control over that.

As we worked our way down the street, I found quite a few shops selling sheet soles. Sheet material is what we generally use for our zero-drop boots because it allows us to build the sole without introducing a raised heel.

I found a few different patterns and compounds that looked promising, so I picked up some samples to bring back to the workshop and test.

But what I really want is to develop our own zero-drop sole.

We already did this with the outsole we use on our heeled boots, and I’d like to eventually do the same thing for the zero-drop models.

That led to the most interesting meeting of the day.

I found a sole maker who can handle relatively small production runs and can also develop molds for us. The compounds he had in the showroom felt good, and the quality looked promising.

Most of what he currently produces is aimed at dress shoes, but he also had several soles with more aggressive lug patterns. That told me pretty quickly that there’s enough flexibility there for us to start a conversation about something designed specifically for Naang.

We talked about rubber compounds, mold development, production quantities, and what would be involved in creating our own design.

He also had one particular sole sitting in the showroom that I could not stop laughing at.

It may be one of the most unique sole designs I have ever seen.

I don’t think we’ll be offering that one on Naang Boots anytime soon, but I definitely got a kick out of it.

After exchanging contact information and finishing our conversation about compounds and molds, we walked a few buildings down and found a small beef noodle shop.

They basically had two things.

Beef noodle soup with slow-stewed tendon, and beef balls on skewers.

So obviously we ordered both.

The beef balls were grilled until they had a little char around the outside, but the soup was the highlight for me. The tendon had been cooked low and slow until it practically melted in your mouth, and the egg noodles were chewy and excellent.

It was exactly the kind of meal you hope to stumble across after spending the morning walking around Bangkok.

By the time I headed home, I had a full stomach, a handful of sole samples to test, and a promising new contact who might eventually help us produce our own Naang zero-drop sole here in Thailand.

Not a bad way to spend a Saturday.

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Shope Naang Zero Drop Boots

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