How To Make Moccasins - By Crazy Crow Trading Post
How To Make Moccasins - By Crazy Crow Trading Post

Rate This Consequence

HOW TO MAKE MOCCASINS

Ready-Made Moccasins  •  Moccasin Making Books & Videos
Moccasin Kits  •  Moccasin Making Supplies  •  Online Resources

HOW TO MAKE MOCCASINS

Ready-Made Moccasins  •  Moccasin Making Books & Videos Moccasin Kits  •  Moccasin Making Supplies  •  Online Resource

Crazy Crow Trading Post Craft Focus Article

How To Brand Moccasins ~ What are yous looking for?

Welcome to i of the nearly popular "Moccasin" pages on the Web! This folio volition introduce yous to "everything moccasin" that Crazy Crow Trading Post offers. From set made moccasins, to moccasin kits and patterns, books and videos about moccasin making, and everything you'll need to make them, and information on the history and origins of moccasins, including a photo gallery and links to other online resources, it's all here on the Crazy Crow Trading Post website.

The point of this page is to be a focal point for folks that find us through any number of internet searches. Nosotros want to make sure that, whatever your reason for looking for "native american moccasins" online, that y'all'll observe information technology here and follow other links to the products or information yous're looking for, whether on our website, or some other nosotros link to.

An Introduction to Native American Moccasins

Moccasins are the footwear most often associated with traditional North American footwear. Depending on location and available materials, other types of footwear were also worn: woven sandals, boots, and leggings attached to shoes. The origins of moccasins undoubtedly originate in climates and conditions that made it necessary to make protective footwear. Wearing moccasins or boots would have been essential to keep feet from freezing. In warm weather and mild surroundings, protective footwear would be less of import and people could hands go barefoot.

Kiowa High Tops- How to Make Native American Moccasins - Crazy Crow Trading Post

Why do we call this footwear "Moccasins"?

Ultimately, the give-and-take "moccasin" came to identify the leather footwear of most of the Indian people of North American due to the circumstances of earliest contacts betwixt white settlers forth the New England coast and their nearest native neighbors. The word moccasin moccasin derives from the Algonquian language Powhatan word makasin and from the Proto-Algonquian discussion "maxkeseni" (shoe). "Moccasin" traditionally referred to a shoe with a puckered u-shaped "vamp" over the instep. The proper noun of the Great Lakes Ojibway tribe means "people of the puckered moccasin". The southern New England Narragansett word for shoe is "Mocussinass" or "Mockussinchass". Today the word moccasin, known by a variety of spellings, more often than not refers to all types of difficult and soft soled shoe styles, with and without puckered toes, originating with Native Americans.

Moccasins Fit the Human foot, and the Environment!

Arapahoe Hard Sole Moccasins - How to Make Native American Moccasins - Crazy Crow Trading Post

Difficult Soled Moccasins

Native American moccasin styles, how they were designed, and the materials used to make them, were the result of their specific surroundings. Hard-sole moccasins always fabricated in rights and lefts, and ordinarily made from two or more pieces of hibernate, are associated with the western plains and deserts areas. The thick, hard sole of shaped rawhide and fitted leather upper required more than tailoring than other types of moccasins. Hard-soled moccasins protect anxiety from harsh cactus or prairie-grass covered ground or sharp rocks.

Soft Soled Moccasins

Soft-soled moccasins, often fabricated from a single slice of leather, were common in the Eastern Forests and were fabricated by bringing up the sole of the shoe around the foot and puckering or patching the material around the instep. Soft-soled center seam and pucker-toe moccasins were particularly well suited to travel through woodlands with leaf and pine-needle covered ground. Some soft-soled moccasins from the Plains and Northwest Declension were fabricated from 1 slice, but they were sewed along 1 the side of the pes rather than the center.

Iroquois Soft Soled Mocs - How to Make Native American Moccasins - Crazy Crow Trading Post

The near basic grade of soft-sole moccasin was the unproblematic center seam made from a single piece of soft-tanned leather. The leather sides were brought up from the bottom and around the sides of the foot sewn in a key seam starting with a puckered stitch at the toe and running along the upper instep. Variations of this soft-sole moccasin construction include a u-shaped piece of leather, added as a vamp, while some other piece was added to the dorsum of the moccasin to serve as a cuff.

Some of the Great Lakes and Iroquois tribes used a broad vamp, added in a gathered style to cover most of the upper forepart of the moccasin. Other Eastern Woods tribes synthetic their footwear with a shorter or narrower vamp that sometimes joined a central puckered seam running downwards the upper forepart to the toe.

Iroquois Soft Soled Mocs - How to Make Native American Moccasins - Crazy Crow Trading Post

Tribal Variations in Blueprint & Ornamentation

Tribal differences in moccasin design and ornamentation could literally be said to begin from ground up! So distinctive are some moccasin styles that y'all could tell the tribe of the wearer by his footprints. Moccasins were made with all types of variations and additions according to the styles of different tribes. Flaps of leather or fur were ofttimes added to embrace the ankle, or folded down as a cuff. Some moccasins were made into a boot simply past attaching them to the leggings. Various sized u-shaped or elliptical pieces of leather, chosen vamps or insets, were added to the moccasin upper at the instep. A natural language for hard and soft-soled moccasins was frequently added and cut into various forms and decorated.

Many methods were used to pucker the toes of woodland center-seam moccasins. A distinctive "rabbit nose" or "partridge" moccasins could be sewed by trimming the design commencement into a "w" shape. There were too many ways to finish the heels of moccasins. Varieties of Eastern Woodland moccasins often left a tiny tab, or tail, trimmed to different shapes, that dragged behind. Other one-piece moccasins have no tail, or the tab is sewn upwardly to the heel for added reinforcement. Some moccasins of the plains and prairie had fringe hanging at the heel seam or added onto the instep; equally fringe trailed behind the walker, it may have helped to obliterate footprints.

Eastern Woodlands Soft Soled Mocs - How to Make Native American Moccasins - Crazy Crow Trading Post

Eastern Woodlands Soft Sole

Fifty-fifty where moccasin construction techniques are similar amidst tribes, the quilled (and after beaded) decoration was usually quite distinctive. Woodland moccasins were oftentimes decorated in floral or zoomorphic (animate being) designs, on the instep or tongue portion, woodland decoration did not unremarkably cover the sides of the moccasin. The flap or added cuff around the talocrural joint was too often decorated, or worn upright and held in place by thongs wrapped around the ankle. A split up beaded or quilled piece of velvet or leather was sometimes sewn on top of the cuff or tongue portion. These decorated panels could be easily removed from the moccasins when the soles wore out, and sewn onto a new pair. Plains moccasins often left the gage undecorated, just geometric bead and quillwork patterns often decorated the instep portion, or around the circumference most the sole. Some Plains designs covered the unabridged top of the moccasin from the heel to the toe. Moccasins worn for marraige were oft completely covered in beads. For Plains peoples preparedness in the afterlife, many moccasins worn into burying were fully beaded even on the bottom of the soles.

Moccasin Construction: Picking the Right Leather - How to Make Native American Moccasins - Crazy Crow Trading Post

Moccasin Construction: Picking the Right Leather

Moccasins were normally made from the soft tanned hides of deer, moose, elk or buffalo. Rawhide was used for the bottoms of hard-soled moccasins. Hides from the larger animals were much thicker than buckskin. Thicker hides were more difficult to sew, but produced sturdier, longer lasting moccasins. Sewing is easier with soft Indian-tanned (or brain-tanned) leather, but commercially sueded and carve up leather (more commmon past far today) is besides suitable for moccasin making.

Commercial leather is most like encephalon tanned leather when it is split (sueded on both sides), equally the smooth outside of the hide has been split off. Leather thickness is measured by the weight in ounces of a square foot of leather. Very thin garment leathers, 1-2 oz. weight, is usually besides thin for practical moccasins, while heavy leathers, 5-6 oz. weight, can exist nearly impossible to sew past mitt. Medium thickness leather (iii-4 oz. weight) is recommended for near soft-soled moccasins. Patterns should exist laid out on the hide so the pieces go with the grain of the leather, so the moccasins volition be uniform. You can conserve leather by laying out the pieces to be cutting from the hibernate in more effiecient space-saving locations, merely since the leather stretches in different directions, sewing tin can get a petty irregular if the grain direction is ignored.

Moccasin Leather Stitching Methods - How to Make Moccasins - Crazy Crow Trading Post

Stitching Methods

Moccasins are assembled inside out to hide the stitching in the finished footwear. Traditional sewing would be done with animal sinew through holes punched with an awl. For comfort, knots were kept on the exterior of a shoe. The whip stitch was commonly used in moccasin construction, often with an added narrow welt running the length of the seam to get in stronger and to help hide the stitching when turned correct side out. The running stitch was also used in places where the whip stitch was not as practical (adding fringe, etc.). Seams were often gently pounded flat in puckered areas.

Moccasins Gallery

Helpful Moccasin-Related Links

Video: How to Make Side Seam Moccasins
This is a step by stride video of how to brand a pair of Side Seam Moccasins. Example uses moo-cow hide, suede and lines them with natural colored, sheared, beaver fur. These moccasins should be water resistant because of the contact cement used between the suede sole and beaver pelt.

Making Center-Seam, Pucker-Top Moccasins By Talon Silverhorn. Step-by-step illustrated instructions.

How to brand one-piece Soft Sole Moccasins in Tutorial Section Forum
This tutorial provides instruction for making one-piece hightop moccasins. While the focus is on a featured pair of moccasins, at that place are bviously many other styles, many teachers, and many books from which to depict inspiration and pedagogy. The degree of detail provided is with the beginner in mind. If yous have some experience you volition exist able to skim over much of it. This is the first of five parts.

Wilderness Survival Skills and Bushcraft Antics: Moccasin Making
Moccasin kicking hybrids – sometime meets new (traditional buckskin woodland footwear, with a modern twist.

How to Brand Moccasins and Mukluks
How to make a pair of woodlands style moccasins with fur trim. A gratis pattern is available in a adult female's size 7 (as a PDF file – you volition need Acrobat to view).

Instructions for One-piece, Soft-Sole, Center-Seam Moccasins
Native Tech: Pace-by-step instructions for making your own paper blueprint and ane-piece, soft-sole, heart-seam moccasins.

Arapaho Moccasins
From the Museum and Research Center of the American Mountain Men: Article from Tomahawk & Long Rifle. Detailed sketches and description of moccasins, circa 1900.

Judy Kavanagh's Moccasins Collection Gallery
Moccasins from her personal drove, mostly soft-sole, Woodlands. Other galleries are available on this website besides, including Plains moccasins and mukluks.

M A T Due east R I A L South & S U P P L I E Due south

Your Source For Native American Moccasins & Moccasin Making Craft Supplies

Crazy Crow Trading Post has long been your number ane source for Native American Indian arts and crafts supplies for your Prisoner of war Wow regalia and other needs. This photo gallery represents and article represent moccasins of all regions and tribal origins. It, similar many of the articles and galleries we add to the website are works in progress. If yous find something that needs correction, or have something to add, either as narrative or photos and video, nosotros appreciate your contribution. We cannot guarantee that anything submitted will be included, just it volition be reviewed carefully.

Click whatsoever link below to view detailed product and ordering information.

Leather for Moccasin Uppers

  • Buckskin – Commercial Tan – white, golden, willow; sizes from 4-6 sf – fourteen-sixteen sf
  • Smoked German language-Tan Buckskin – best quality for moccasins & dress
  • Elk Hides – white, gilt; sizes from x-thirteen sf – 16-19 sf
  • Cowhide – diverse types & grades; good substitute for more expensive deer & elk

Leather for Moccasin Soles

  • Moccasin Soles: White Latigo – heavy leather, approx 1/4″ thick; tough & long wearing
  • White Latigo Sides – avg size twenty-22 sf; bang-up idea if doing lots of mocs

Needles • Thread • Lacing

  • Glovers Needles – heavy needles with sharp triangular edges for sewing hides
  • Sharps Needles – short, stiff needles best suited for lazy stich or applique beading
  • 18-carat Sinew – clean & ready for use in craft projects – the 'original' thread!
  • Faux Sinew – excellent substitute for the real affair, extremely strong

Seed Chaplet

  • Czech Seed Beads
  • French Quondam Time Seed Beads
  • French Seed Beads
  • German One-time Time Seed Beads
  • Italian Seed Chaplet

Cones: Tin, Aluminum, Copper, Contumely

  • 18-carat Tin Cones – sizes: ¾", i″, 1-1/8″, 1¼"
  • Aluminum Cones – sizes: ¾", 1″, ane-one/8″, one¼"
  • Brass Cones – sizes: ¾", 1″, one-i/eight″, ane¼"

Tools

  • Pair of scissors – assorted styles, high carbon stainless scissors make cutting leather
  • Dewdrop Graph Paper – developed past Crazy Crow for lazy sew together used on moccasins

Other Featured Products

  • Volume Preview: Native American Moccasins – Frank White (2014 Edition, due January 2014)
  • Moccasin Making DVD – Frank White
  • How to Make Moccasins – Plains Indian Hard Sole (DVD)
  • Indian Lore Seminar Series – CHEYENNE MOCCASIN CHARACTERISTICS DVD
  • Indian Lore Seminar Serial – MOCCASIN CONSTRUCTION TECHNIQUES DVD
  • Beaded Moccasin Tops

Tags: Indian Moccasins, Moccasin Patterns, Moccasin Kits, Leather Moccasins, Tall moccasins, Indian Footwear, Native American Footwear, Howdy Top Moccasins, Native American Moccasins, How to Make Moccasins

CRAZY CROW Articles

Crazy Crow Trading Post July - Current Crow Calls Sale

Current Crow Calls Sale

March - April 2022

Salve 10%-xx% on popular powwow, rendezvous, celebrated reenactor, bead & leather crafter supplies. Powwow and Rendezvous season is almost here! Save on many of our nearly popular items such as Commercial Elk Hides, White & Smoked Colour Buckskin, Men'due south & Women's Colonial Buckle Shoes, Riflemen'due south Half Boots, Civil War Brogans, Plains Hardsole Moccasin Kits, Pw Wow Drums & Drumsticks , Can Campware, Imitation Hairpipe (all sizes & colors), Jingle Cones & Lids and much more for your adjacent arts and crafts project. We've added many new item as well every bit we become ready for Catalog 38 for 2022.

Crazy Crow Crow Calls Moccasin Kit Sale- Save 20% on Select kits
Crazy Crow Crow Calls Lids & Jingles Sale
Crazy Crow Crow Calls Splie Elk Sale
Crazy Crow Crow Calls Smoked Colored Buckskin Sale
Crazy Crow Crow Calls Commercial White Buckskin Sale
Crazy Crow Crow Calls Powwow Drum & Drum Kit Sale
Oil Tanned Blacksmith Sides 3-4 oz earth tone colors - Crazy Crow Trading Post Sale
Readymade Drumsticks & Drumstick Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post
Trekker Half Boots Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post
Mens & Womens Colonial Buckle Shoe Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post
Civil War Brogans Shoe Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post
Southwest Shoulder Bags Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post
Concho Handbags Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post
Western Style Backpack Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post
Stainless Steel Knifeblades with Brass Guards & Leather Sheath Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post
Stainless Steel Knifeblades with Brass Guards & Leather Sheath Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post
Indian Style Iron Lance Heads Sale - Crazy Crow Trading Post

Rate This Article