This Transforming Shoe Could Change Footwear Forever (EXCLUSIVE)
Shoes are hard. Blame your feet, blame the wildly varying fits utilized by all the different footwear companies that make shoe sizing a best-guess situation. (That's how even cushioned shoes come to cause blisters.) Also, shoes get dirty insanely quickly. Oh, and, worst of all, they wear out quicker than any other piece of clothing because they're rubbed away with every step.
But what if they weren't?
As the founder of the shoe-obsessed platform CONCEPTKICKS® and design studio and agency CONCEPT(K), Daniel Bailey has spent the past 13 years innovating on shoes at the behest of companies like adidas and Timberland. He's only just now producing shoes for himself. But what makes his first shoes ingenious isn't the shoes themselves. It's what's underneath.
"[A sole's] rubber components inevitably wear out first," Bailey tells us. "But by the time that happens, a good leather upper might only just be starting to get interesting: it's formed around your foot, developed creases and patina, and started carrying some history."
Bailey's new label Terracotta is launching with, essentially, sturdy leather shoes you could wear forever. Just about.
Previous alternative shoe-sole attachments, like Nike Considered's woven soles and Snow Peak's transforming New Balance boot (which sported a modular upper rather than sole, never achieved anything equivalent to Terracotta's three-piece sole unit.
Here, the shoe sole, a flimsy little thing too often glued or stitched directly to the upper, is reconsidered as a modular unit that can be removed and replaced with gusto. And with shoes that look this good — debut Terracotta silhouettes include a hiking-style shoe, a derby, and a slick mule, all realized in tonal black leather — you'll want to keep them around for a long time.
"The basic idea is that different parts of a shoe have different functional lifespans," says Bailey, "Rather than allowing the shortest-lived component to determine the lifespan of the entire shoe, the ground components can be replaced while the upper and structural components continue aging."
Simple idea, wild execution. It took Bailey and Italian sole company Vibram six years to nail the concept. But "concept" is key — you don't bring in the guy who named his company "CONCEPTKICKS®" for low-hanging fruit.
Let's go back to the beginning. What got you interested in footwear?
A combination of architecture and basketball. I grew up with a real reverence for basketball shoes and their ability to represent much more than their function: an athlete, a story, a particular moment in culture. That idea of an object becoming a vessel for something larger has always stayed with me.
While studying industrial design, I also realized footwear operated at a scale and pace that suited me. Compared with architecture or automotive design, I could have much more influence over the complete object.
What would people most likely know you for?
People probably know the adidas work most, but Zegna was one of my favourite development experiences.
They gave us incredible access to their artisans and facilities in Italy. We had to retain the existing Triple Stitch midsole, but I wanted a different proportion to the upper, so we developed a construction where a single piece of leather wraps around the sole three times to create the new geometry. I love when a technical constraint ends up informing the aesthetic.
How do you feel about the state of sneakers? Are you still excited? Jaded?
I'm still excited. I think we're coming out of a period of hyper-innovation — supercritical foams, additive manufacturing, computational design, AI, new materials — where technology sometimes became the idea itself. I've definitely been guilty of that too.
What's interesting now is seeing taste catch up with the technology: understanding where these tools genuinely improve an object rather than using them simply because they're new.
The industry also feels much more open than it did 10 or 15 years ago. Consumers seem more receptive to unfamiliar proportions and ideas, while independent designers can now put experiments into the world without necessarily needing a major brand to validate them first.
AI will push that even further. However I will say that though creating a convincing imag
e of an extraordinary object is becoming incredibly accessible; understanding material, construction, manufacturing and how to actually realize that object isn't.
That's the part I'm increasingly interested in — not only designing objects, but understanding and designing the systems that allow them to exist.
Talk to me about Terracotta. What exactly is it?
Terracotta is definitely a brand, although I'm deliberately allowing it to de fine itself through the work rather than deciding exactly what it needs to become upfront. Currently, it's entirely self-funded and independently owned, which gives me the freedom to let it evolve naturally.
It started during the COVID-19 pandemic with the question of what I would make if I was making something entirely for myself. And, as the project developed, it became unexpectedly autobiographical.
I was born on a British military base in Cyprus. My father wore leather derbies in the military and learned to ski in the Troodos Mountains; my mother is German. Years later, I found myself researching British military footwear, old ski boots, and Bavarian Haferlschuh [traditional side-laced Alpine shoes]. Those connections weren't calculated — I recognized them over time.
Longer term, I see Terracotta as more of a product and systems company driven by research and experimentation. Each product can become a continuation of that research. The continuity is in the thinking and research that produces them.
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