ZENG Jie has been in the industry for a long time and had a brilliant experience. Now, he slows down and focuses on making high-quality shoes.
Let’s take a look at the story of Zeng Jie, the backbone of Yearn Shoemaker.
Please introduce yourself to everyone.
My name is ZENG Jie, and I am 47 years old. In 1996, I entered a shoe enterprise and came into contact with the most traditional workshop-style shoe production technology.
In 1998, the company cooperated with Belle, the largest shoe company in China. At the request of Belle, it changed from manual workshop production mode to semi-auto production line production mode. Belle’s focus was women’s shoes, and Belle brand chose us to develop men’s shoes for it, which was a compliment and recognition. The first pair of Belle men’s shoes was developed and produced by my company at that time.
From 2004 to 2015, I worked as the design director and technical director of the company, and also witnessed Belle’s development and brilliant achievements, as well as the company’s glory and ups and downs.
With the continuous impact of the Internet on people’s lifestyle changes, I had my own ideas on the future development and judgment of the footwear industry, so I chose to resign from the company in the second half of 2015 and chose to enter a relatively unfamiliar traditional handmade shoe industry.
The establishment of the workshop was done a little bit, right? What hardships did you encounter in the middle?
The establishment of the workshop is entirely in love with shoes. In my previous work experience, I often studied and learned the innovation of European shoe design and technology. Why foreigners can design and make good products with such high added value, while few in China can reach such a level, so I made up my mind to learn the way of hand-made shoes from scratch.
The workshop officially started on February 16th, 2016. We set a goal to study various requirements of hand-made shoes in three years, to understand the foot type differences in China, the pain points of foot last conversion technology, the cognition of top-grade raw materials, the research on color-changing technology of uppers, the research on manual sewing and appearance modeling, the aesthetic and comfortable appearance of the last, the balance of layout lines, and so on.
It was only after three years that we found that the pit was a bit deep.
What stages did you go through when you made your own leather shoes?
Up to now, it has been in the period of precipitation accumulation.
How to balance your work of managing the workshop and bespoke shoes?
There is not much conflict between these two things, so there is no balance.
What are the characteristics of your bespoke shoes?
Balance between comfort and aesthetic feeling of appearance lines.
The other is the beauty of the lines of shoes, of course, aesthetics is more subjective.
From the practitioner’s point of view, what are the defects of Chinese bespoke shoes?
There is nothing wrong with the custom-made shoe industry itself. In fact, there are many excellent craftsmen in China, and the main problem comes from the outside world.
One is the market environment, then the number and cognition of consumers are still lacking.
In addition, the social environment, the pressure of survival and universal values do not allow you to concentrate on becoming a real shoemaker. Therefore, few domestic shoemakers can finally persist.
Why does it seem that people in this industry are unwilling to communicate and share?
I don’t agree with this statement. I actually have a lot of communication with many peers.
What kind of comments do you want your work to get?
In fact, I didn’t think about it. I should do this work well first, and any comments I receive at that time will be helpful to me.
