Wacky Pack Interactive Footwear by Ye Shen is a highly esteemed winner of the very prestigious 2023 Silver A' Design Award in Footwear, Shoes and Boots Design Competition Category.
SilverFootwear· 2023
Wacky Pack Interactive Footwear
by Ye Shen
Client: Ye Shen
Silver A' Design Award Winner in Footwear Category
Verified Award Winner
Verify Award Status for #150436The Design
About Wacky Pack Interactive Footwear
Wacky Pack is a collection of shoes that explores new ways to close footwear. Each pair replaces traditional laces with an alternative fastening system, such as a shoe cover, metal snaps, or a full zipper. The closures change how each shoe is worn and allow several looks from a single pair. Veg-tanned leather in various thicknesses and custom metal hardware are used across the collection. Pattern pieces were hand cut, sewn and hand lasted. Extensive prototyping refined the proportion, the soling methods and the closure design.
The Recognition
About the Silver A' Design Award
Wacky Pack Interactive Footwear is a Silver A' Design Award winner, an extraordinarily prestigious recognition granted to top-of-the-line, gorgeous, and impressive designs. Silver winners are tremendously brilliant and exceedingly creative works that illustrate the outstanding expertise, talent, and acuity of their designers. Wacky Pack Interactive Footwear is expected to be a wonderful, showpiece work that is remarkably professional and profoundly innovative. This Silver A' Design Award-winning design is a highly notable, admired invention that benefits and advances the boundaries of art, science, design, and technology. Wacky Pack Interactive Footwear is a vastly envied creation that evokes desires, introduces positive feelings, and sparks amazement and wonderment.
Where to Get It
Experimental Footwear Design Services
We specialize in creating innovative footwear concepts that challenge conventional design. Our expertise combines industrial design principles with emotional storytelling to develop shoes that provoke thought and inspire interaction. From concept to prototype, we bring fresh perspectives to footwear design.
Contact UsInterviews
Design Interview
What is the main principle, idea and inspiration behind your design?
The investigated question is inspired by the constantly hyped sneakerhead community, where so many conversations happen around all kinds of footwear, yet for many people, their only interaction with the products is to take them on and off. As an industrial designer, I frequently reflect upon the relation between products and users, also I'm poised to provide the most unexpected and unique user interactions with the products I design.
What has been your main focus in designing this work? Especially what did you want to achieve?
The Wacky Pack challenges the mundane concept of footwear closures, the goal is to push the boundary of wacky methods that a shoe can be "tied".
What are your future plans for this award winning design?
This is just the volume one of my endeavor of footwear closure exploration. Like a chair's function is to suspend a person's butt 30 inches off the ground, there are unlimited possibilities of how a shoe can be "tied". Of course, selected styles within this footwear collection will be produced in a very limited way.
Behind the Design
Press Kit
Credits, team members and technical details provided by the designer.
- Unique Properties
- Wacky Pack explores the concept and possibilities of footwear closure, or traditionally speaking, "how-to-tie-a-shoe". It explores unorthodox construction and fastening method, creating unique yet diverse interactions between the shoe and the user, providing a new level of improvisation and customization for your day-to-day look.
- Tags
- Interactive Footwear, Fashion Sneakers, Alternative Closure, Shoemaking, Leather Goods
- Production Technology
- Veg-tanned leather with various thickness and metal hardware were used across the pack. All non-leather soft materials were dyed to match the cream color. The hardware selection was custom-tailored to perform the unique closures.
Each design was explored and validated through intensive prototyping to finalize the proportion, soling methods, and most importantly, closure system design.
All pattern pieces were hand cut, cemented, sewn, then assembled with metal hardwares and hand lasted, finished with various soling techniques and materials, finally sanded and finished. - Research
- Gen-Z and Millennials will soon be (if not already) the core consumer of fashion and luxury. With low brand loyalty and contemporary view of value, all they are after is fresh concepts that grab their attentions, concepts that become the pieces and its value.
Brands are all playing up to these desires. But with the Millennials’ quick shift of attention, very soon a pure concept won’t attract them anymore, and they would want something more, they would want to be a part of the concept. - Inspiration
- What does it mean to tie a shoe? Why does it need to be tied?
If all a shoe need to do is to enclose your foot, how differently can a shoe perform this task?
Can the mundane action of "shoe-tying" turns into something more meaningful or entertaining? Can the closure dictate how a shoe works, or become a shoe itself? Can it alter the user's experience and behavior? - Project Duration
- This Project was created in a 4-month period in Fall 2018, within a shoe-making course taught by Anne Marika Chasse at Rhode Island School of Design.
- Operation Flow
- Bao Bao: Shoe born inside a shoe cover. Wear it close, wear it open, wear it flipped.
O Snap: Turn O-snap on, snap pieces to each other. Snap None or snap all; snap some or snap one, it's up to you.
Sticky Fingers: Shoe zipped all the way around. Zip or unzip, front or back. Zip it close, hide inside; Zip it open, reveal yourself.
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