Floppies, sloppies, jandals - no-heel footwear have various names. They have their good features and their bad features as do roman sandals even with their subtly located strapping, unchanged for millennia. Any half-baker like me, always dreaming of improving accepted designs should truly “fear to tread” down this particular path. But here goes. I visualise a heel-less floppie given a springy heel-shaped padded “T” firmly located by a bent-forward, under-extension of the “post” of the T. To put the “Gripper” on you ease the shaped T-back, using its springiness, and insert a foot. Sproing. Hm.
-- rayfo, Aug 19 2000

I can't visualize this. More explanation?
-- StarChaser, Aug 19 2000


Fair enough! How about the tactile approach. Find a discardable shoe [not a boot]. Put a strip of one-inch masking tape down the seam of the heel-end. Mark halfway on another piece the same length and put it horizontally, ccntred on the seam and level with the top either side of the “heelcup”. Now imagine all the rest of the shoe excep a toe-place cut away leaving only the taped complex curved “T” standing a the back - made from springy hard-soft plastic. At this point put another piece of tape, same length again, on the “floor” of the shoe to simulate the hidden support-strut for the vertical flexing post, thickening where it bends during putting on and taking off. So what have we got? A new race of hybrid footware, [called TeeBars now of course], as airy and quick-on-and-off as thongs and as safe as all the fiddly do-ups - in my dreams.
-- rayfo, Aug 20 2000


I think I've got it, but it works better to visualize if you start with a low high-heel. Remove the heel and you're sort of walking on your toes? I like it...I wouldn't wear one, my feets too big, but they'd be cool...
-- StarChaser, Aug 20 2000


Hrm... this calls for another annoying halfbakery modification idea. we need a _very_ simple sketching utility to allow idea-makers to add drawings to ideas... Do any java applets out there work well, consume small amounts of space, and export jpegs or gifs to a parent server?

on the topic at hand, Essentially, your shoes have a "fold-back tab" to hold the rest of the foot in the more-or-less normal sandal part? This tab is a t-shaped springy thing that normally lays flat against the heel area of the sole and is farly durable without being uncomfortable or blister-raising, right?
-- bear, Aug 22 2000


You could use Paint or something, then post it on your own website...
-- StarChaser, Aug 28 2000


Yes ... thanks to The Design Group I now visualise a two-mode product, the "Shoof", 1. as a safe-walking/driving outdoor shoe with the springy heel-grabber up, or 2. as a convenient indoor shuffler with the heel-grabber flipped forward and down, nesting level-surfaced, into its shape in the insole.
-- rayfo, Sep 25 2000



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