The Van Dahl Shoe Factory

I've completed a write up of the visit to the factory in my Artefact LO1 and LO2 posts, but I thought that I should do another small post about what I expected and what I discovered at the Van Dahl shoe factory. Before we went I thought the factory would simply be a large building with a huge sign saying "Van Dahl Shoe Factory" and I expected the interior to be like the inside of a warehouse with machinery, half made shoes and boxes as far as the eye could see, but no, I was wrong. When we entered to factory we were greeted by glass doors and a hallway, which along one side had a large crest and around it many of the older shoe making tools. Then more glass doors and we were in what seemed to be a conference room because of the long table and a white board. Along the left hand side there were lots of Van Dahl shoes and a few of  their handbags which were in three different colours, red, black and light green and were all a cube shape . After a short talk with David,( I have posted information about the talk he gave us)  who acted as a kind of tour guide  took us through some more doors and up some stairs into an office area, here we were given talks with two of the workers at the factory. I found that not everything is down to the men and women working the machines, it all starts out with research, sketching and computer technology. Then it goes down into the lower levels of the factory which is where the shoes are put together as I described at the top of this post. 


some of the shoes and handbags 

My Campaign and Artefact Video Journals Will Be Posted Soon

I've finished my artefact and campaign journal, I would put these onto my laptop to be edited so I can post them, but my lap top has crashed and it should be fixed soon, I hope. In these journals I will talk about what I have done in the previous week and what I hope to do in the next.I may be able to get use of my friends lap top and edit the journals on there so I can post them here on my blog. Sorry for the inconvenience.

Campaign - LO1 - "Tiredness Can Kill" Caimpagn Reaserch

The main message of the Tiredness can is to stop people driving when there tired in case they fall asleep at the wheel. The target audience of this campaign are people that are doing long journeys in cars overnight. They way they get the messaage is to place signs across high traffic roads. I couldn't find out about the success of this campaign unfortunatly

Campaign - LO1 - Our Campaign For The RSPCA

Our Campaign for the RSPCA is not goign well, we have not recieved any donations from last week, I think this has happend because we only managed to make posters and leaflets. We are trying to get donations this week by giving tutors letters to read out in form time the mornings and we will make more posters to tell people were to donate to and when.

I could not document my visit to the RSPCA charity shop because I did not speak to the manager and was not in the shop for long because I was not alowed inside until I had finisded the drink that I had. 

Artefact - LO2 - Part 2: How I will produce my Artefact

1. Mould the shoe over the shoe last using mod rock.
2. Remove mod rock from our shoe last.
3. Make mouth in the front of the mod rock shoe.
4. Make tongue to fit the mouth.
5. Make teeth using gum shield to put inside mouth.
6. For the teeth on the bottom of the shoe mould them out of plastercine.
7. Make heel out of a tooth brush and a dental mirror or another tooth brush.
8. Make eye out of plastercine.
9. Make the eye socket above mouth and insert eye.
10. Drill 5 holes into two tooth brushes for the lasses of the shoe.
11. Put tooth brushes equally apart on the tongue of the shoe.
12. Thread dental floss through the holes in the tooth brushes for the lasses.
13. Attach all the different parts together to Finnish the shoe.
14. Finally, add colour to the shoe, by mkae the head piece of the shoe skin colour, and the rest of the shoe white

Artefact - LO2 - Part 1: Some of the materials

Some of the materials that I am going to use for my artefact are things like felt for the tongue on my shoe, the plaster cine for the teeth, in the mouth and dental floss for the shoe lasses.

Atrefact - LO1 - Part 4: The purpose

The purposes of the artefact's made by Florida Shoes are simple, to be worn by female customers for style and comfort.

Atrefact - LO1 - Part 3: The Impact of Technologies

Florida Shoes had an interesting impact on technology because of its incredible ion-mask technology that makes the shoe 100% waterproof and dirt proof. They showed us this on one of the shoes that had recently been through the simple process, they put a few drop[s of water onto the shoe and the water just stayed on top of the shoe in a weird bubble. This technology was engineered by the ministry of defense!   

Atrefact - LO1 - Part 2: The Process

The process used in making shoes at Florida Shoes involves lots of stages. One of the first is to find out what materials and colours people will want to have on there shoes. Once they have done this they will sketch out the design of the shoe to the correct measurements then send them so be loaded into a computer programme in 2D then sent to a machine to be cut out on thick paper to be used as an outline for cutting the material, which is the next step. The materials are cut out using a tool known as "the clicker" because of the noise it makes when it comes off the material. The material is now sown together into the correct shapes, while this is happening the soles of the shoes are attached to the heels of the shoes. After a few other steps that I do not know about because the machines were so loud that I couldn't hear what people were saying, they attached the leather to the shoe with melted rubber. Then after some more unkown steps, the finished shoes are cleanded using fire (For some reason) and then are boxed and sent to retailers.

Atrefact - LO1 - Part 1: The Materials Used

One of the main materials used in shoe making at Florida Shoes is leather used as what the shoes are mostly made out of, other materials used in the shoes are metal for the buckles on the straps or strong cardboard as the soles of the shoes.

My Shoe Design Plan

1. Mould the shoe over the shoe last using mod rock.
2. Remove mod rock from our shoe last.
3. Make mouth in the front of the mod rock shoe.
4. Make tongue to fit the mouth.
5. Make teeth using gum shield to put inside mouth.
6. For the teeth on the bottom of the shoe mould them out of plastercine.
7. Make heel out of a tooth brush and a dental mirror or another tooth brush.
8. Make eye out of plastercine.
9. Make the eye socket above mouth and insert eye.
10. Drill 5 holes into two tooth brushes for the lasses of the shoe.
11. Put tooth brushes equally apart on the tongue of the shoe.
12. Thread dental floss through the holes in the tooth brushes for the lasses.
13. Attach all the different parts together to Finnish the shoe.
14. Finally, add colour to the shoe, by mkae the head piece of the shoe skin colour, and the rest of the shoe white