Description

Get ready for the warmest, lightest, coziest pair of winter footwear you have ever worn. Handcrafted by you – there is simply no more satisfying way to travel in the winter than with a pair of moccasins you have made yourself!  Like all of our products, we have personally tested our moccasins on northern expeditions up to 40 days, and 250 km in length.

Our winter moccasin making kits include all materials and instructions required to make your own pair of custom, deerskin winter moccasins.  You supply socks and a few basic household tools.  These are the same instructions we provide at our moccasin making workshops, which we have used to help hundreds of people make moccasins in the past 10 years.

What’s the Difference?  Canvas & Hide Uppers.

Our hide upper moccasins and canvas moccasins are different takes on the same product.  Performance-wise both of these products will behave almost identically.  Both the split-grain hide and cotton canvas uppers are lightweight, durable, breathable, nearly wind-proof and quick drying.  The choice comes down to one of aesthetics.

Canvas (this kit): Our canvas moccasins are sewn into a tube which you pull on over your calf (like a standard boot) and then secured with a wrap-around lace.  Being a pre-formed tube, the canvas is a better medium for decorative ribbon and fur trim.  The canvas can also be dyed any colour you wish.  Canvas uppers, being a woven fabric that requires hemmed edges, really are best completed with a sewing machine.

Hide (link): The split-skin moccasins are not sewn up the front – instead they are wrapped around your calf (with a generous overlap to seal out the snow), closed up with a deer antler button and then secured with the same wrap-around lace we use for the canvas.  Split-skin hides comes in a wide variety of colours, from earth-tones to fun and funky.  Inherently simpler than the canvas, and slightly easier to pull on, choose the hide uppers if you want a very simple style.  The hide uppers do not require hemming the way woven canvas does.  Hide upper moccasins were designed to be completed with minimal or no sewing machine use.

Included in these canvas upper kits:

• Thick felted wool boot liners
• Felted wool insoles
• Enough deerskin for the moccasin lowers, plus extra scraps to make thimbles, and use as a repair kit If you are new to leather work, we suggest the 3oz hide as it will be easier to work than the heavier weights.
  
• Canvas
• Decorative ribbon
• Light cotton tape for binding bottom of uppers
• Light cotton webbing for wrap-around ties (ends sealed with beeswax)
• Light cotton webbing for upper ties
• Deer antler buttons [hide uppers only]
• Artificial sinew
• 2 x “Glovers” or “triangular” needles
• Paper patterns
• Full colour bound instructional booklet

NOTE: SIZING GUIDELINES

MEN: Go up one or one and a half sizes for added wiggle room and insulation. For example if you are a size 10 you will choose a size 11, and if you are a size 10.5 shoe you will choose size 12 for your kit;

WOMEN: Choose your regular shoe size for sizing. For example if you are a size 8 women`s then choose size 8 men`s. This will allow enough room for added insulation and wiggle room. If you are a half size, women will round down.  For example, a size 9.5W will choose a size 9M.

Decorative Trim

Please add into your order notes your top 3 choices of decorative trim. Our stock is always in flux and so it might not be possible to get your top choice. If you do not write in your order notes we will choose a beautiful trim for you! 

Add a Sole!

Adding our painted rubber sole to your moccasins will prolong the life of moccasins exponentially with yearly maintenance. See the “Video and Print instructions” tab for a full video of the soling process.