Customise your shoes with Sugru

Shoes customised with Sugru

Sugru Mouldable Glue is soft and malleable, but it’s also durable and waterproof enough to last outdoors. Since it turns into rubber after it sets, it’s perfect for fixing and protecting your shoes. 

To personalise your shoes, all you need is some Sugru, a piece of tracing paper, some tape, a rolling pin, and, (most importantly), your imagination.  

Plan your design

There’s a range of options available to you at this stage, and they require a little pause for thought. Do you want your design to blend in or stand out? Do you want it to match or contrast? Do you want one colour or several?

We’ll stop now. But have a think. What do you imagine?

back of shoe customised with Sugru

Prepare your design

Once you’ve picked your colours, roll the Sugru into little balls to prepare them for application. 

If you’ve chosen to go for multicolour, at this stage, you may want to think about how you’d like this to appear on the shoe. If you’d like a design such as a flower, place the balls in that shape. If you’re going for a coloured patchwork, keep them scrambled. If you prefer a pattern of colours, line them in an order such as ‘orange ball, yellow ball, red ball, orange ball…’ You get the picture. 

small ball of Sugru

Trace the Sugru

Now it’s time to grab your tracing paper. Put one layer underneath, and one layer over the Sugru balls.

balls of Sugru between sheets of tracing paper

Roll the Sugru

As shown in the video, roll the Sugru balls flat with your pin over the top of the tracing paper and then peel the top layer of the tracing paper off carefully.

Tape the shoe

Before you apply the Sugru onto the shoe, tape it first to prevent the Sugru sticking too far along or onto the fabric areas. 

tape placed on shoe

Apply the Sugru

Bring the tracing paper over the rubber section of your shoe and firmly press down again with a flat hand. After a good patting down, slowly and carefully peel back the tracing paper. For extra awesomeness, you may want to dip your finger into some warm soapy water at this stage and rub it over the Sugru to give it a firm, shiny, flat finish. 

tracing paper peeled off Sugru on shoe

Wait 12-24 hours

We know you’ll be excited to put on your new dancing shoes, but you can’t just yet. Once you’ve taken away the masking taped areas to reveal a neat and compact design, 12-24 hours of waiting is required for the Sugru to set into a flexible rubber. Perfect for happy feet.

Shoes customised with Sugru

The potential for customised Shoegru hacks has got us excited, here at Sugru, because everyone wears shoes, and everyone is different – meaning endless design possibilities. For your chance to win some free Sugru, why not share a photo with us using  #mysugrufix on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter