Designing a Custom Shoe With Shoes of Prey And the Ikea Effect

 Bonjour, bonsoir.. welcome to the blog. Today, I am sharing my experience designing a custom pair of shoes with Shoes of Prey. ( SHOP HERE ) I am going to also attempt to share some insight about why we love the things that we create/design/personalize more than the things that we pick up from a shelf.

I have been a fan of Shoes of Prey since I discovered co-founder Jodie Fox on youtube a couple of years ago. I have been considering to reach out to the brand for a collaboration on a gifting basis since I am a micro blogger for a while but doubt kept me away. I finally jumped the gun and hit them up on instagram and they agreed to gift me the experience so that I can share it with you here on the blog and on instagram.

If you've never heard of Shoes of Prey, here is a little bit of background. The company was founded in Sydney, Australia in 2009 by Jodie Fox and two partners. They are known for their personalized design where every day women would go on their web site ( www.shoesorprey.com ) and design a custom shoe at a reasonable price. They offer an extended range of shoe sizes from a US size 2 to a a size 15 in narrow, wide and extra wide widths in most styles.

The process was super easy! You pick the style of shoe that you would like to design and personalize, for example, pumps, booties, etc, then you shoes the color, the material (mine was a mix of genuine leather with patent leather on the heel) then you choose the hardware, the sole and finally at the end you choose whether to encrypt your name in the shoe or not. You can encrypt anything in there besides your name but keep in mind that it is only going to be inside of the shoe. They also have a chat assistant person on the site that can help you with any questions that you may have while designing your shoes.

I had my instagram friends share in the design and personalization process with me. Shoes of Prey has a wide range of styles that you can choose from mules, to loafers, sneakers and pumps. One of my instagram friends told me that she was inspired to design her wedding shoes from the web site after seeing me design my boots on insta stories. One of my favorite thing about personalizing my design with Shoes of Prey was the fact that I got to write my name in the shoes!!!! The brand was kind enough to offer a discount code for you to write your name in your design. The code for a free custom inscription is MSNERDYCHICA (Valued at $49).

When the shoes arrived, I could not wait to wear them. They are my favorite pair at the moment. I know that Summer is right around the corner but I plan to wear them even in the summer. This obsession reminds of a Ted Talk that I listened to a while back about human motivations. In that Ted Talk one of Guy's guests spoke about an experiment that he conducted called the Ikea Effect (Very interesting stuff, you can find it on youtube) and they concluded that the reason why we love things that we create/make/design more than one we pick up already made at a store is because we feel a sense of identity, pride, ownership, creation, and meaning when we create something. I suggest you search for the ikea effect on youtube for an in depth look at how this works.

Thank you so much for stopping by. See you soon!

Au revoir,
Deb