Leesa Simpson is Sneaker Stitch

0:00Hi, I'm Maria Thea Harris or Vella Soes on social media. Welcome back to Server 50s podcast on Soulganised Style. Make sure you like and subscribe, Cellganised Style podcast on your podcast at and on YouTube. So that's how so I'm going to start it and it basically started in a fairly small way at my kids school in an empty classroom before we eventually in six months we moved into our own building which was a cute old corner shop in my home suburb. That's Lisa Simpson of Sneaker Stitch AU on Instagram. Many people know of Lisa in Queensland through her sewing classes she provided at sewing adventures for over seven years. Sewing adventures close last year making way for her quilted sneaker obsession through sneaker stitch AU. On another topic if you live in Australia and decide to purchase your own mimicry custom dress form I'll be your body scanner go to minicreens.com to book your scanning session. Now let's grab a cover to hear Lisa's story. It's nice to finally meet you so. Oh Lisa I knew

1:06of you through sewing adventures and then all of a sudden all these sneakers were popping up with sneaker stitch so I thought that's why I had to contact you because I thought this is really exciting. Yeah super super exciting. It's actually almost 12 months to the day so around early February probably when the kids went back to school I saw these little sneakers fly into my inbox and I was like oh my gosh I am in love just has some of my few favorite things so we've got to say shoes sewing fabric my other ones flowers but we can add them in on the print design so I saw them I thought oh my gosh so I started to do a bit of a deep dive and that really was looking into what are these where do they come from what's available and that's when I discovered Rodric so Rodric is quite a unique human being he lives in the Netherlands and he designed these sneaker stitch is a leather shoe maker he also teaches classes so

2:11he crowdfunded to get these painted or designed and manufactured so he was a small business once too and then he obviously now distributes them to many people all around the world I was like I love this I want this you don't have anyone big here in Australia I want to be that person that's how it started I totally understand how you've seen something you want it we live in Australia and even though you're distributing here in Australia I think it's really exciting that we get these opportunities from someone who's as forward thinking issue and now anybody can get in contact with you and so that you know their own sneakers that is all about them and that's the thing I think it is because it's totally unique and just like a few people said to me oh Lisa you know it might only have a short life I said well everyone wears shoes

3:11it's like bags bag patterns for bags haven't really gone out of style so and I've been really really lucky that when I first started up I had people like lovely Janelle from Emma line bags I reached out to her she was so lovely and was like she was dealing with Rodric already and I was like there's also some makers in Canada and the US have also been just so generous with their time and I think that's what part of the sewing community is all about it's great that you can contact other people who have some insight that can help you establish what you're doing here in Australia so that's great because it was a big process you know from initial communications and what are we going to do and at that stage I was still running sewing adventures I'd just be sort of received the news the shop was going to be sold and that my lease would be ending so it was kind of a really big transition for time but anyway it was great to be able to reach and I think that's really important to say how thankful I was but those

4:16people don't know me obviously it's a little girl in Australia but when you ask for help and they give it so freely it's really lovely you know you're in Queensland and you've got this product and it all fits in because I know that the people who I am friends with who sew in Queensland love color absolutely love color and your sneakers just fit the bill like Deb who's been at your class absolutely and the thing about it is you can actually you can make me whatever you want to make you know if you want to be bright and that's what I said with some of the pairs on a show when we're on show you know this has four different kinds of fabric in it but you don't have to you can make it all in one but you know we've all got this I think I've got this idea I might make it a bit of a movement I call it the China cabinet my mum and daddy when they got married they've got all this beautiful crockery in China and Bristol and for years it sat in the cabinet and I think with shoes it's time to get that

5:20special fabric out of the cabinet okay out of our stashes and actually use it because how to go with this sadly and I think if you've got something it doesn't take much fabric use that special fabric and wear it I like how you've got examples of shoes that are using Sashiko as well because so many people love doing it and what do you do with the product and the shoes are a really good way to do it so my lovely friend Nicole from Forever Blue who used to do some teaching with us she's absolutely amazing she does a lot of borrow and Sashiko she also does a cabana and she is passionate and her shoes are just amazing do you slow stitching yeah and then turn it into a piece of wearable art you might have also seen the shoes from another friend of mine who does collage quilting and she basically collared made her collage fabric

6:26and then made it into shoes I guess my childhood upbringing my parents worked very very hard we did lots and lots of craft and activities my grandmother actually owned one of the first health food shops in Australia so I think I mentioned to you before that we were a bit hippie so you know our lollies were vitamin C tablets we had carobies, straggs you know our spaghetti ballinets was filled with vegetables or that kind of thing so my mum was one of the first handmade soap makers in Australia which at the moment seems really but back then you know she was like oh my gosh I'm gonna do this and nobody else made it and we were market kids so we went to the craft markets first you know from up here in Brisbane people might know close burn which came onto Petri we did spring hill fair we were market kids every Sunday we went and when I was a teenager they used to drop me in the city to do the city markets while they ventured on up further that was part of our life and

7:28even my dad so my dad was actually an engineer but he actually decided because he didn't want to be left out he decided that apart from working his you know five-day week he was going to run food stores part of the markets as well so that's kind of where we go so we were encouraged to sew mum bought us all sewing machines another funny story that I often tell is that before I was born my mum bought her first sewing machine they bought a bought their house here in in Brisbane and an upcoming suburb they also mum bought her sewing machine which was a blue top Elmer okay so back in 1972 that Elner cost her five hundred dollars so to give you some sort of idea my parents also before the year I was born what a block has land on the gold coast the twelve hundred

8:31dollars okay so that sewing machine was priceless that sewing machine and she paid it off yeah dad never knew how much it cost was it on lay by or something yeah it was like a way but you take it home but it was like a lay by program right yeah so I've still got it it still works as well today that I always did beautifully made but we always joke that the house was much more so we saw that a few years ago we still had it up to to fund my dad's retirement and aged care and the house was worth much more than the sewing machine so think about that as a high school what are you running markets your dad was also doing food markets on the weekend as well what did he serve doing he was doing with us so he would come to the event that my mum with the the market my mum was going he was making his speciality was he would

9:34do have a ham and avocado rolls with salad and he would also do falafel good on him falafel pockets so you know I guess that gives you a bit of a hippie she made soap for 15 years and it was beautiful and we were really lucky things like when we got old enough from we had we had a perfume that we liked she used to buy that perfume and make us our own soap she's wonderful she could make Chanel number five so now that's a skill all the old fashioned ways well so you know we had bees hives in our suburban backyard we had fruit trees we were you know just doing our thing I think that's what we say anyway you know keeping bees keeping animals living in an urban environment you know there's

10:36all the council rules you guys just were able to do it it's great yeah we did it my sister had a horse that we adjusted down the road and we were in our home was in sunny bank hills which was it is approximately 14k's out of the city on the south side yeah so it wasn't upcoming suburb but yeah so totally totally different lifestyle I guess and many other people before you started sighing adventures which is now gone what's your background because it's not just about sewing is that you started elsewhere I did so I worked in retail for when I was job my first real job was working for a company called House and Garden which was a home shop okay so lovely beautiful things I worked with them for quite a while I also worked in the gift wholesale industry I worked

11:39with a local agency and went to the trade fairs with them which still run today so I worked House and Garden for quite a while before I got an opportunity to move into center management so the days of shopping centers were great I worked in several big major centers and developed a part of their business that was just upcoming and quite unique in terms of obviously making money for the owners so at that stage I probably wasn't sewing as much as I was I think you go through different life changes yeah and it wasn't probably until I moved forward a little bit and had my children which I did a little bit later in life that I think you're like you know you want to do all the kids you pretty things for them so that's where I kind of dived back in you know I guess I was lucky is the fact I was helped so many retailers and small businesses with their business so that's sort of like and my parents

12:41entrepreneurial things always encouraging you to do something and you know have a go see what happens part of your having a go was setting up the subscription boxes the first ones in Australia yeah yeah another first I know it was crazy I was working full-time and I was like we need to do this so there were a couple of subscription boxes but it wasn't a thing like if you go back it's like what and people love the concept and so we used to basically put together every month a box full of some sewing tools some fabric a pattern so that's where I really stepped back in I started working with lots and lots of local pattern designers and that's where I found my feed I guess I was like this is so fun it's interesting we were doing a kids box four times a year and adults box every month we were doing a seasons box which was kind of like a fashion box orderly we're up to about 400 subscriptions a month on top of my full-time job

13:47so if you ask my kids about packing boxes when they were little they will run a mile when we were starting to see a stitch they said don't put them in boxes whatever you do do not put them in boxes look it was a really great time and I think part of the thing there is obviously technology has changed a lot too so then the dollar was changing from what we were buying and importing the website needed to change and sadly with that website change we had to move over to a new platform and also to cope with the changes and sadly the website team really let me down so then that was the end of the boxes so yeah so basically the new website went live we bought about 60% of our subscribers over and I will say hello to everybody because there's so many people that I still know now from those days yeah we bought about 60% over to re-subscribe but the developer had

14:52set the subscription to one-off I think it was a 27th of December when you space to start seeing sort of the next subscription money rolling in and I'm organising stuff there was nothing so we had to go and re-ask everybody in the new year to re-subscribe and it just you know we all have lives and expenses so we just didn't recover from that so it took a little bit of a while until the middle of the year and I said okay I can't rebuild this business so I had two young children so I was waiting full time I was working as a business development manager at Indropilly Shopping Centre which is a major regional outlet I worked there for 12 years through their redevelopment and sadly during that time my husband left almost overnight and I had a seven-month-old and a four and a half year old that's tough that's really tough it was it

15:54was very very difficult time I was very lucky my family is very supportive you know for a while they mum and I lived together she did boxes as well but I think I was looking for ways to be creative but also be entrepreneurial yep so that's kind of like it was like you just keep on going keep on going keep on going or to keep swimming like the Nemo fish yeah yeah keep going you're now taking full response like you always had responsibility of your family but it was just you and your your immediate family giving your assistance with a really really young family working full time and then you started signing adventures at what point um so I actually took a bit of a break um I was working obviously still time still in centre management yeah I've been there for a really long time um I've been through three management changes um I've been through two

16:59the birth of two of my children I've been through a marriage separation um and after the redevelopment I think my boss called me in one day and she said oh please you just you seem to have lost your spark and she said oh you really need have a really good think about what you want to do um and so I was one of these people I was very lucky I did my job very well but I did it well too well because in my detriment whenever I wanted to move to a different department they wouldn't let me go oh yeah so I um came home had a think right at my resignation letter and came in the morning and put it on her desk and she cried and I gave them three months notice which is crazy amount of notice to give everybody so hello anyone who's listening out there from the old days um and at the end they still haven't found anybody and they wanted me to stay longer and I said I know I'm done so I came

18:00home I had a lot of obviously I had long service leave I had lots of holidays and it was nice to actually just spend some time I guess with my kids yeah um pick them up from school go to the school functions do all those kind of things so that became my focus and then I was like okay now I'm bored yeah I'm bored what am I gonna do so I actually went and started um working in a fabric shop um on the south side of Brisbane um and basically doing you know three to four days a week in school hours cutting fabric working with colors talking to people um maybe a bit mine numbing at times but the people were lovely yeah and that that's the thing I guess we kept hearing over and over and over again how do I put these colors together how much fabric do I need for this can you help me straight my overlocker so that kept building and building and building but we wanted to do some classes but um sadly that wasn't on their radar um so I was like well

19:02I'm gonna if I can help everyone else with their businesses I'm gonna put together a business plan and see how I got and that's when sewing adventures started yeah so that's how sewing adventures started I went and did um a government funded program at that time it's kind of like training central links so because obviously I still needed to make some money I needed to have some money coming in to make us all live and survive um and so yeah so that's how sewing adventures started and it basically started in a fairly small way um at my kids school in an empty classroom um before we eventually um in six months we moved into our own building which was a cute old corner shop in my home suburb everyone thought I was crazy maybe I was maybe I am well I think when you are working something through for the first time that people don't expect you to do yeah they think you're crazy but I mean you had a plan and you got assistance and you gave it a go yeah and I think the main thing that was um

20:08what unusual it wasn't unique absolutely not unique but at that time there was so many quilting shops closing they couldn't believe that I was going to run a shop that was just based on education without having the support of selling sewing machines to back me up so yeah they everyone thought I was crazy and also not to just focus on patchwork or quilting but to do more predominantly dress making it was a little bit unusual um I think I proved them right I think I did well I think you did too because whenever I've seen on the Brisbane Spill at Facebook page you know when people ask a question in the past your shop sewing adventures was one of the few places that people would recommend you know go for some sort of education it's usually

21:09like beginners or something new so yeah that's how I got to you about it yeah and look I've been really really lucky I've been part of the Spill at for many many years uh right from when we started I was I was part of their group um I actually um taught Sandy Batch from so over 50 I grew taught her granddaughter to sew ah yeah I'm not sure why I got the challenge but you know so we actually taught I think over the um eight years we were running I taught all of the beginner adults classes and I added it up and I think I taught over 3500 people beginners how to sew adults yeah and on top of that we had all of our kids classes and they were I think that's probably the hardest part um because we had so many kids that came to us and that grew up with us sadly it came to an end I think the point that you've that you've made with the number of people that had

22:11connected with you I've seen online you had um Deborah who was on the great British sewing bee and she came and she ran the French jacket class and like that was really exciting that it was your shop that she went to to run the class and that group that have that did the class still get together and so so I think that demonstrates how connected you are to people how connected um sewing adventures is to the community and it's totally understandable that once you connect together you don't want to lose that connection no and look we had a lot of amazing um contract teachers we've had so many amazing people but Deborah is kind of a little bit unique because she actually reached out to me and I was like oh my gosh it just so happens her brother lives here in Brisbane yeah so that's how that all came about but yeah she's a lovely lady extremely

23:13talented that was our final class the day they finished we were having a cell off of furniture they're trying to those finished up and they're all socialising and I'm like moving things around quickly going on sale we're getting rid of all this furniture so it's kind of a bit bittersweet hmm but I think we went out with a bang you certainly did and so now you've got sneaker stitch what's the plan there and how are you rolling it out so as I said um it came up as this idea it took me quite a while to negotiate and work out what we were going to do coming into Australia from the outside looking in it kind of looked like we were a follower in the marketplace um due to timings and things like that because we have to understand that this product is manufactured obviously in Asia there's a lead time and a shipping time and all of those things um so when we hit the market the idea was let's do something again let's be different let's

24:16offer so many choices okay we didn't want to pick people's fabric but we wanted to give them heaps and heaps of choices in terms of colour and things that make them happy so that you can make it your stop so if you wanted to make shoes with the lemons on it like on your top that you're wearing yep do that so that took a lot of time I've imported many things over the years so finding new suppliers um you know working with them making sure the packaging's right so we've rolled that out we opened um hoping July but we opened in August and we've had an amazing I guess we're almost first year although a lot of that was in the planning so um going to shows meeting people talking to people um actually trip to China to the canton fair um to go and see and find some new suppliers and see what else was out there so it's been a really really busy but exciting time

25:19and on the website the sneakerstitch.com.au website all of the places that you've planned so far to be at for letting people know about sneakerstitch so we've got a little bit of an upgrade to do at the moment we're doing a little bit behind the scenes on the website that will all be things so we're going to all the big shows this year um so we were very very lucky we're going to AICC um in Melbourne um we'll be doing craft and quilt in um Brisbane Sydney and Melbourne later in the year um we're also doing some of the craft live shows so our first one's up in Tuumba we're also working with a lot of shops okay so we've actually got um shops from all over the country who are currently making their shoes because they're going to be teaching their own classes we're still going to teach them classes here in Brisbane but obviously we can't be everywhere at all the time

26:25and we think it's really really important so we will still actually sell the product but what will happen is they'll become part of our our team and our partner program um so that they get the benefit of working with their local community these great shops with great teachers and then they don't need me so that's going to be really exciting this year we've got uh it is a lot of travel I'm a little bit stressed but I'm sure we'll be fine oh it sounds like you've got all the plans in place and probably be plans as well not just the A plan yeah and like you can't see it from here but up on my wall is a wall an A4 calendar wall of every month and there's stickers and there's colors and there's all sorts of things so the other thing you probably didn't know well you might know I also run the Brisbane sign D stash market tell me about that when we were at some adventures I was like okay let's do a little D stash market we did it in the grounds of the um of the shop we had about 20 operators it was an amazing day we decided we need

27:33to upgrade we moved to the local senior citizens club we broke Soulsbury because everyone was like where are these thousands of cars parked all around the suburb what are they here for and someone goes oh it's a sign market yes it was a sign market so sadly the senior citizens didn't want us to come back it was just a little bit too much for them so we moved over to Macarat show grounds so we've been running over there for probably the last four years we run two markets a year in March and September we're typically between 80 and 100 storeholders patterns for charity we've raised thousands of dollars for local charities we collect patterns all year and then we basically sell them for two dollars on the day and all the money goes to the charity um we work at a local quilting people but yeah it's a lot it's hard work yeah but it's certainly

28:36lots of fun um this year we are and I haven't really haven't even made an announcement yet but we're are going to move our format a little bit we're going to go to um one event a year okay um which will be held sort of maybe yes so um so we're looking at that in June at the moment just to know it'll be a bit cooler yes it'll be a bit cooler and it just um you know finding the places that we go to as we know with sewing adventures in the shop things change places change the Macarat show grounds are changing um and so we have to move forward with those times as well okay but it's always lots of fun so if you're up in Brisbane come on up okay I've written that down it's in my diary so Lisa what two pieces of advice would you give people who are thinking of making their first sneakers my first thing is make sure you get the best product okay make sure because you know

29:42with us we're doing new videos and stuff all the time we're here to help you and support you and with our makers group find the fabrics that you love first okay because if you know what fabric you want then it's easier to add all the little accessories and things to that so just remember that you can use any sort of fabric it can be quilting cotton okay probably can't use stretch although I do have something really cool coming up with some crocheted fabric pick your fabrics pick something you really love and it's going to also match in with your style and your outfit okay once you've got those pick out all the favourite colours okay you're going to put these on your feet if you want to make them nice and neutral absolutely if you are a tour fan till the fan Liberty fan you name it you can make it okay if you don't want to use your bestest fabric but I'm challenging you to do that um you know go to your local okay

30:46buy something that you're going to wear and love and I just think I'm putting out a few more resources at the moment about doing some planning um because when I make my shoes I sort of plan I'm also like okay what else can we incorporate make a beautiful blouse make a scarf for winter that matches your shoes make a bag so that you can actually use your other patterns that you've got sitting in your stash okay use up some of those things and wear it proudly with five so that would be my most thing fabric first pick all the fun things I think we have 35 colours of shoe laces okay that's a lot that's a lot to figure out you know if something matches with your fabric you really want to use um give you an idea um we've been getting new colours so here's our panting book we looked at what we were missing and we've just gone back and ordered some new colours that are coming in as well because we want people to really make something that is like

31:50totally unique also the other thing I will say that's quite a little bit unusual um I'm personally doing some curated fabric packs um I'm working with spoon flour so they're not typical designs because some people from my previous past working with fabric you know they go I just don't know what to put together I don't know how to make this work um and if that is you what we want to try to do is provide something that's totally different it's not sold at your quilting store um I've personally chosen these um and we'll be doing like short releases there'll only be like four packs of each colour um so we want you and we challenge you to make the best sneakers that you can make think outside the box oh my gosh those kits are just going to fly out the door I can tell you I can tell you I can't put like yeah sorry I'm just really pleased that you've said that you've

32:53got these unique kits that are coming in yeah and what I really wanted to make it it important because we got it in shows and things like that is I don't want to compete with the lovely retailers that we work with already and when we go to a show sometimes people go I want that fabric and we go and find the retail that has it so that they can buy that fabric so we've tried to make it so that when we're not stepping on their toes we're doing something different and I'll have to give you a sneak peekery and because you might like it because I can see that you're wearing women yep okay I'd love that and we'll put together they you know it's just putting in all because some people go I just don't know what to put with this and whatever so I love that I'm great at that so and I love colour so you know this is like keyboard wow this is my mouse oh okay so I know I'm just wearing blue today but it looks better on camera

33:57sounds wonderful I'm so glad that you're into Carla you now to put colors together you've got the kits and you've got the special kits so I think there's a lot that we're going to be enjoying this year from you yeah absolutely amazing got some new tools coming our way as well so yeah we look forward to it so Lisa thank you for giving us your backstory for talking us talking to us about the exciting things that are coming up with sneaker stitch and you know it's really I'm really pleased that I've been able to meet you virtually and hopefully we can meet each other in real life yeah oh it's been amazing I really appreciate it I've never done anything like this Maria so thank you for inviting me and I'm sure our piles will cross oh I hope so thanks Lisa bye see you later this episode of Salgona style podcast for server 50 was both video and audio produced by me Maria Thea Harris in my sewing room with permission of Lisa sound by caneefe on YouTube many thanks for the ongoing monthly support of the podcast patron contributors

35:02their paid patron membership enables me to create this video and audio podcast for you for free you can subscribe to Salgona style podcast but with an s not a z on all good podcast apps and on YouTube and yes if you live in Australia and decide to purchase your own mimic wind custom dress form I'll be your body scanner for mimic winds UK make sure you go back and listen to our free server 50 podcast episodes on Salgona style direct message sandy and editors at server 50 on Instagram to contribute to the ongoing posts and challenges the team promotes to the community I look forward to joining you in your sewing room next time stay safe everyone