Fashion footwear grounded in Coast Salish art
Over the past year, using sharpies and pencils, Louie Gong has transformed shoes popular with the surf and skate crowd into culturally inspired works of art.
Gong, of mixed-race heritage and raised on Indian reservations in Washington and British Columbia, combines the traditional crescents and form lines of Coast Salish art with the contemporary styles of Vans shoes.
The result is eye-popping custom-designed footwear that sells for $200-plus a pair and on which customers are free to express their own identities — like the Irish customer who wanted to incorporate a clover leaf into her shoe design.
This week, the 36-year-old will be one of eight Native designers from across North America participating in an aboriginal fashion show during the Olympic Games.
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