Composition Grandma’s Craftsmanship [Qiren]

With plain uppers, thick white soles, and boat-like shapes, traditional cloth shoes with mille-layer soles are gradually withdrawing from people’s sight. But in our county, there is an old woman who holds a needle and thread in her hand every day, wearing a thimble on her finger, and picks up the Thousand Layer Bottom stitch by stitch. For decades, she has been busy with the thousand-layer cloth shoes in her hands. She is 73-year-old Wu Shunqin, who is also a famous "cloth shoe grandma" in the neighborhood. Walking through the Sipailou section, people can always see the "Grandma of Cloth Shoes" Wu Shunqin with her head buried, wearing reading glasses, and holding her small cloth shoes stitch by stitch. Elegant upper, thick sole and exquisite workmanship. The experience of "Grandma in Cloth Shoes" can be traced back to her childhood. As early as more than 60 years ago, "Grandma Cloth Shoes" followed her mother to learn how to wear shoes, and was praised by the neighbor's aunt as a "little girl with quick hands and feet." Keep the workmanship and process in mind. When she got home, she cut old fabrics like adults, glued the uppers with glue, and threaded threads... After several experiments, the shoes she made turned out to be decent. Speaking of cloth shoes, before the 1980s, almost every Chinese had a pair, mostly black and of the same style. But today's cloth shoes seem familiar, but completely new. Today's cloth shoes and traditional old cloth shoes have undergone revolutionary changes in style and color. According to research, handmade cloth shoes have a history of more than 3,000 years in China. The earliest handmade cloth shoes are the handmade cloth shoes with soles worn by the kneeling statues of warriors of the Western Zhou Dynasty unearthed in Houma, Shanxi. "Grandma Cloth Shoes" told reporters: "Look at the soles of these shoes, you can't make one sole in a day. Layer by layer, they are pasted, then dried, dried, pasted again, and then combined into soles. There are many processes one by one. It is made stitch by stitch using traditional native methods, and the craftsmanship of a pair of shoes mainly lies in the sole. "It seems that making the sole is not a simple matter. The old man said that these soles are called thousand-layer soles because of their many layers. Although there are not thousands of layers, each sole has at least 50 layers. They are filled layer by layer with cotton cloth glued together with glue. made. Not only does it take a lot of effort to make the soles, but also requires more than a dozen processes to make an upper. Cutting the coat, cutting the shoe upper, trimming the shoe collar, and installing the lining are all indispensable. Nowadays, nostalgia and returning to simplicity have become the trends pursued by modern people. Although these handmade cloth shoes are time-consuming and laborious to make, they are favored by the public because of their breathability, comfort, lightness and other advantages. When the reporter was interviewing Wu Shunqin, the "Grandma of Cloth Shoes", a customer happened to come to her home to buy cloth shoes. A customer told reporters: "Some leather shoes cause athlete's foot after wearing them. If the quality of the glue used in the leather shoes is not good, it is definitely not environmentally friendly. And these handmade cloth shoes, especially for children, are comfortable and warm." They are also environmentally friendly, so I went to the house of "Grandma Cloth Shoe" and planned to buy two pairs for my children. "Warmth, dryness and comfort have become the biggest advantages of handmade mille-layer cloth shoes. Elder Wu Shunqin said that although making the cloth shoes was not easy, she was very happy to engage in this craft because she thought it would be good for the children. At the same time, the old man also hopes that more people will pick up needlework and cloth shoes, so that this traditional handicraft can be passed down.