Strike a Pose: Shoes with Attitude

If by any chance you happen to notice that a coincidental passer-by stepped on a banana peel or that bubble-gum is stretching on her sneakers, take a closer look as you may well be looking at a pair of shoes from the wackiest footwear collection in the world.

Upon graduating in 2001 from the Bezalel Academy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem, Kobi Levi decided to specialize in footwear design, both its development and production. Even though he’s currently working as a free-lance designer, he collaborates with both Israeli and international companies and is working intensively on his unique men’s and women’s shoe line in Tel-Aviv. In addition to his place of origin Israel, his talent has been recognized by shoe industrialists in Italy, China and Brazil, with whom he has established collaborations. Visitors of several large exhibitions in Tel-Aviv, Jerusalem, Tokyo, Verona, St. Etienne and Berlin also had the pleasure of enjoying the masterpieces for his more daring fans.

In regard to how he came about such an unusual idea and as to why he decided to get into shoe-designing, Levi explains on his blog: “In my artistic footwear design the shoe is my canvas. The trigger to create a new piece comes when an idea, a concept and/or an image comes to mind. The combination of the image and footwear creates a new hybrid and the design/concept comes to life. The piece is a wearable sculpture. It is “alive” with/out the foot/body. Most of the inspirations are out of the “shoe-world”, and give the footwear an extreme transformation. The result is usually humoristic with a unique point of view about footwear. Another aspect of the creation is the realization. All the pieces are hand-made in my studio.”