(2025)
reimagining the future of footwear
3D printed, transformable, experimental and adaptive footwear for the urban office worker.
Exploring intersections between digital design and the body.
RHINO CAD
TPU FILAMENT
RIB KNIT SPANDEX
PROCESS
Early on, our team knew we wanted to explore wearable design, intrigued by the intersection of the body and computer-aided design.
We considered sunglasses, earpieces, and other fashion-oriented
concepts before ultimately landing on footwear. Shoes, we felt,
offered a range of exciting and dynamic possibilities.
Once we settled on a shoe, we were struck by the range of aesthetic and functional possibilities—from experimenting with materials to altering the walking experience to creating something sculptural.
We ultimately developed a modular connection system to support these possibilities in future iterations. Starting with a foundational design, we aimed to leave room for more unconventional outsole modules. Our focus was on building the system itself before defining a specific use case.
The question became: how could this modularity serve a purpose beyond just interchangeable fashion?
After extensive discussion, we identified two key footwear trends it could support:
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Sustainability – Modular design allows for easier material separation and recycling.
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The barefoot shoe trend – While barefoot shoes support posture and gait, they aren’t suited for concrete streets. A removable outsole lets users enjoy barefoot benefits during hikes or indoors, then switch to cushioned support for urban environments.
When considering the function of STOMP, we decided that simplicity was best. A TPU outsole that interlocks like LEGO brick with a very thin TPU insole (acting as the barefoot sole) would offer lots of potential to play with infill settings and ergonomics.
Before we started making anything, we did extensive research on the ergonomics that typically go into making a shoe, which helped inform where to start our material tests and form experimentations.
Before moving into the digital space we made a lo-fi prototype from a sock, shoe insole, cardboard and elastic to visualize our system.
Working with a 3D scan proved more challenging than expected—its complex organic shape, with numerous points and polygons, often caused issues in Rhino. As a result, we had to experiment with several workarounds to achieve the desired outcome.
Ultimately, we decided on print infills and tread patterns that most aligned with our research, while still being feasible within the project.
For the shoe body, we wanted a sleek sock-like look while maintaining comfort and breathability. We started with a generic sock pattern and expanded from there, experimenting with foams, stretch materials and varying panel structures.
The fabric prototypes were then tested in tandem with digital outputs, giving us our first insights into how the materials interact with each other, as well as with the body. Many small tweaks were made with the lacing systems, ergonomics and materials.
Our 3D modelling struggles led us to jump around from Rhino, Grasshopper, Cinema4D and Blender.
Slowly, we worked our way towards a projected tread pattern, proper arch support, and a functional lacing system.
Ultimately, although the inside was a perfect print, the outsole tread made the cleanup job post-print quite tedious.
As a team we each brought a range of skillsets to this outcome, resulting in a very dynamic and interdisciplinary piece. Although this project was a lot of fighting with programs, ultimately it taught us a lot about the intersectionality between the human body and physical and computer outputs, as well as how to work effectively as a team with different expertise. We divided tasks based on our comfort and knowledge, but also tried to teach each other whenever possible, resulting in a highly collaborative and experimental process that pushed us all to new levels in different ways. In retrospect, it would
have been so much simpler to just make a basic 3D-printed shoe, especially as none of us had worked in footwear before. But, by challenging ourselves to design a new way of interacting with footwear, we are creating something highly experimental, that shows not only our making and aesthetic skills, but also our problem-solving ones. We all certainly dreamed of a slightly higher fidelity outcome than what we were able to achieve, but we chose innovation over outcome. This prototype would be a great communication tool and proof of concept to hand off to a developer or factory to make that perfect product. In this sense, we used CAD to its fullest potential, not just as an output tool, but also as a way to quickly ideate and test functions without material cost.
