Peep Toes and Eye Heels

In these dark days of Winter, boredom has driven me to craft:

A year or two ago I had a dream about a high-heeled shoe with an eye on the heel, much like the re-creation above. The heel itself was a unicorn horn. I sketched it upon awakening, and while I no longer remember the dream, I remember the drawing. I recently obtained polymer clay, a glue gun, and plastic eyes, to make these:

I didn’t make the shoes themselves; they are dance shoes I bought used for $5 at the local theater’s annual sale a few years ago. The eyes are plastic, which complicated things; the Fimo clay I shaped around them needs to be baked in an oven to harden, but the plastic would melt, so I had to make aluminum foil dummies. Also, they are life-size, which I think is too small. So I ordered some robust oven-safe 20mm glass irises, which finally arrived today, allowing me to make these:

I bought these shoes online, the red ones new, the brown ones used, both made of plastic and very cheap. I’m still developing my eye-making technique, getting closer to what I want. And when I reach my goal, I’ll…what? Look into mass production? I sure don’t want to spend my days hand-making Fimo shoe eyes, but injection-molded ones might be cool. Then people could hot-glue them to their own shoes, and my work would be done.