Everyone owns some form of footwear, whether it be heels, sneakers, dress shoes, or sandals. It is a growing market for collectors and fashionista’s alike. While it may not be easy to select a pair of shoes that fit and look good on you, TheShoeBuff presents 30 Must-See Pieces of Shoe Art that could influence your decision, or at least distract you until you can make up your mind.

Amsterdam Worldwide – Onitsuka Tiger Island

Amsterdam Worldwide is the marketing firm responsible for this cool Onitsuka Tiger advertisement. This company was also responsible for another Onitsuka Tiger advertisement that did not make the list, portraying the shoe as a Japanese street racing circuit.

Arcade Agency – The History of Flight

The History of Flight was a campaign dedicated to celebrate the history of Michael Jordan’s line of sneakers. Each shoe from Jordan sneaker from 1 to 23 (and 2009) has their own design; displaying Michael Jordan’s accomplishments while wearing that specific shoe. It’s gotta be the shoes!

Arkitipintel – Tied Together

This is Arkitipintel’s first nod on our list of 30. This simple concept of tying two shoes together is done wonderfully. An artistic representation of what many office workers feel Monday to Friday under their desks.

Arkitipintel – Walking Bike

Arkitipintel’s second bit on our list comes to you in form of a sneaker bike. This bike clearly has no wheels, but maneuvers the same as a regular bicycle would; except with feet. There is no word whether or not Lance Armstrong endorses this one yet.

Brian Jungen – Jordan Collage

Brian Jungen is a Vancouver-based artist who made internet fame around sneakerheads by taking popular Jordan’s and molding them into something crazy and artistic. This collection of work mainly uses Jordan shoes to create native masks.

Chanel – Guns of Heel

Is that Karl Lagerfeld holding a gun? No, he’s holding a heel. There are many objects that can replace the heel but a gun is daring and simply cool-looking. Pair this weapon up with a heel and it looks like a creative way for James Bond to conceal a weapon on his female accomplice.

Diego Aguilar – Make Your Mark!

Nike has always been consistent with their advertising, constantly putting out new things to keep their market interested. Diego Aguilar is the person responsible for putting out this Nike Football ad; featured in time for the World Cup 2010 tournament.

Gabriel Dishaw – Recyclable Shoes

Gabriel Dishaw, a sneaker customizer, made shoes that were made 100% from recycled metal and recyclable materials. Although these may not be comfortable to actually wear around; it is cool to have as a piece of art, while keeping environmentally friendly.

I Have Pop – Concrete Sneakers

I Have Pop is responsible for placing these concrete sneakers in storefronts across the world. They have appeared in Los Angeles, Berlin, New York City, Vancouver, Amsterdam and San Francisco at the top sneaker store in that respective city. Only 10 pairs have been made of this creative design. After the last pair was delivered, the blueprints were destroyed to maintain exclusivity.

John Maurad – Painted Heels

John Maurad is the artist behind this illusion. At first glance, it simply looks like a regular pair of heels. Upon further inspection, it’s really just a great paint job and a woman (presumably) on her tippy-toes.

Josh Rhode – Track and Field

This ad is mainly a subliminal advertisement to wear Nikes. Going from this image, walking in Nike’s is like walking on a cloud. It will also enhance your overall physical performance. The element of clear blue skies as a background gives it the effect that wearing these shoes will allow you to perform above and beyond.

Lifelounge – Robot Adidas

Wouldn’t it be cool if all shoes had this capability? Tiny technological robot hands to help you with everything close to the ground? Tie your shoes, pick gum off your soles, even scrape some dirt off your toebox. Lifelounge put that concept to work in this Adidas artwork.

Love Me Shoes

Sometimes artists prefer to remain anonymous and this piece is just that. A simple piece using laces to show feelings and love for another, artistically speaking. The ends of laces being used as font is quite creative, it gets better with the bright red heart standing out.

McCann Erickson – India

McCann Erickson is a global marketing company, they made this piece as an installment to bring forth attention to the problems in third-world countries. This one is the India edition of the collection that includes Sri Lanka, China, and Vietnam.

Michel Tcherevkoff – Nature Heels

Michel Tcherevkoff has a whole collection of concepts dedicated to women’s heels. We were only able to select one of the collection in order to save space and time. This one is a specific nod to nature, turning a leaf and branch into a heel. No word whether or not these are actually on sale.

Ndeur – Paper Heels

It seems like heels are a common hit on this list, but this is a pretty cool piece anyways. Ndeur calls this piece “Tara”, the whole thing is made of paper. Good thing she’s not actually standing in them.

Nike Sweatshop

Another satirical piece hits the internet, this one is also unclaimed. Is it immoral to get a quick chuckle out of this comic? Or are you just ignoring the issue? Whomever developed this piece definitely had satire in mind, and executed it flawlessly towards Nike.

Rbelion – Icon Shoes

We don’t know who Currante or Faso are, but we do know that this is one cool piece of shoe art. The Nike Dunk High is the basic design for Nike these days, taking the same path in colorways as the Air Force One did. Rbelion takes us through the simplicity of the reproduction process to create a new colorway, and putting a little twist on it using these characters.

Roger Cardiff – Air Max History

A lot of sneaker heads have seen posters similar to this, showcasing the history behind other shoes. This one is a little different given that Air Max’s were not re-released every year in a new design. Cardiff’s design is something that you would see at the Nike store, we thought it deserved a spot on our list simply because it’s a cool poster.

Site Marca – Tongue

This one off of SiteMarca’s Flickr is definitely up there in terms of creativeness. Flipping the shoe tongue into an actual human tongue; adding a person to use it as a slide adds a slight humor kick. There are some camera tricks involved in order to make the Nike Dunk life size, but they were executed very well.

Stylin Rooms – Rug Sandals

Stylin Rooms is a German Interior Design blog that is behind this idea. They featured this on their blog and it caught our attention to showcase it in our Top Shoe Artwork list. We are not sure if those other sandals in the background come in other sizes though.

Syclo – Lace Head

Syclo is a French blogger/artist that mainly does photography and animation, with a little bit of graphic design every so often. The Lace Head piece was introduced in November 2009; Syclo substituted everyday objects with shoelaces in his other pieces to display his creativity further.

Tai Snaith – Cow Hide

Tai Snaith is an Australian-based artist, writer, curator, and producer. She is a large animal rights activist as evidenced by this Cow Hide display using flattened footwear.

The Sartorialist – Buddies

An outfit spotted on The Sartorialist ended up on our list. A simple picture of two buddies showing their selvedge denim rolled up and their shoes for that day. Something about this picture stands out and makes it easy on the eyes to look at. The simplicity of this photo gives it artistic value, putting it on our list.

Air Jordan 1 Love

We found this one on TheShoeGame under their Sneaker Eye Candy feature, which displays limited edition sneakers in cool pictures. Unfortunately, this one goes under an anonymous author. We love this piece nonetheless, whether or not you are into sneakers, you can love it too.

Heel Steps

This bright-yellow heel display comes from an unknown art exhibition. We really like the concept of heels stepping on each other, as well as the stand-out color used. It really catches the eye!

Hanging by a Thread

Once again, we are left with an unknown admission on our list. Just in this one picture, you can see there is a lot of footwear and even more string. Can anyone count how many shoes are on the wall?

Vinti Andrews – Air Max Dog

Vinti Andrews is an independent fashion designer who’s first appearance comes from a dog. The Nike Air Max model completely flattened and re-constructed into the form of a dog.

Wyman Wong – Heel Dress

Wyman Wong is a Cantopop lyricist singer in Hong Kong, he is already an acclaimed writer, DJ, songwriter, and producer and now he can add shoe-designing to that list. Together with Pedder Red, he collaborated in a series of innovative women’s heels. All of the heels have a special signature design on them that makes them unique to other women’s heels.

R.E. Praspaliauskas – Bread Shoes

The Praspaliauskas twins are the creative minds behind this project. These aren’t intended to be worn, and we don’t think you would want to eat this tasty artwork. This piece re-defines the term “warm and toasty” slippers.

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