DIY: Ankle Strap Shoes

There's something about ankle strap shoes that is so elegant and classy. A pair of good ankle strap shoes are pretty much enough to go from casual to party usually!

Unfortunately, the ones in the Indian market that fall in *my* budget usually appear like this:

Monster shoes

Okay, maybe not entirely like that :)

Nevertheless, the drool-worthy are priced like this:

Jimmy Choo, $2095

I also usually go for shoes that have a low to medium heel (save extra special occasions!), which are hard to come by as it is.

Here's what you do to get them for *almost* free!

What you need:

• A pair of unwanted shoes, preferably pumps
• Craft knife
• A pair of scissors
• Glue (I used Fevicol)
• Gold glitter dots (optional)
• Unwanted/lone earrings (optional)
• An old eyeliner/lipliner
• Jewelry making jump rings, as required.
• 2 Lobster clasps

I used a pair of small-heeled shoes that made up a previous not-too-successful DIY project:

As you can see, the shoe is a little misshapen at the edges and basically looked strange on :)

Step 1: Take your show and using the craft knife, start by cutting the sides of the shoe off. Make sure you cut the two sides as single length-wise pieces.

Step 2: Now take the eye liner and mark where you want the front strap to come on the shoe using two parallel straight lines 1 inch apart. Also mark the length and width of the back support of the shoe. This will hold up the ankle strap. Cut the leather of the shoe according to the marked lines. 

At this point, your shoe will probably look like this:

Don't worry about the unfinished edges - we'll get to them later!

Cut both the shoes identical to each other.

Step 3: Take the side cut-outs and measure around the diameter of your ankle. Cut out 2 strips of the measured length, also about an inch wide.

Step 4: Due to the low back of my shoe, the ankle strap was sitting a lot lower on my leg than I would have liked. This is where the old earrings come into picture. You can use chains, Swarovski stones or anything that catches your fancy to improvise on the ankle strap height!

Put in a jump ring through the back support of the shoes and attach the earring to the jump ring. 

Step 5: Attach the other side of the earring to one side of the ankle strap with a jump ring. On the other side of the ankle strap, attach the lobster clasp with a jump ring.

Check to see if the ankle strap closes perfectly over your ankles :)

Step 6: On the unfinished edges, run a line of glue or Fevicol and drop pinch-fulls of gold glitter all along the way!

Leave to dry overnight.

The final output looks like this:

Enjoy your new ankle strap shoes :)