The birth of our name & logo.

Though, I don't have children of myself, but I can say that giving birth to a brand is not an easy task either. It is a lot of little steps, sometimes a few big ones, and also the odd 'this is too much, I'm quitting this whole show'. But stopping, after already putting months and months of your days and nights in your baby, doesn't seem an option anymore. Also, is this actually a shoe I create for myself? Or am I building a product for others, for both mental and physical health for the people who love to connect to self and nature? Yes, you can already guess the answer...

I started the Instagram page in March 2022, about 2 months before I actually started the production of shoes. Meaning, finding other people supporting me with the 2 hours of the creation of a shoe. Finding repurposed leather to work with. And, have a clue of what I was doing. How the leather stretches... Which glue to use and, which way?

Anansi has been my nickname since 2019 (for the real curious ones, you can read here why) and I have always liked the sound and the symbolical meaning (spider, wisdom, trickster) of Anansi. So, Anansi Footwear became the name of whatever it was back then. But this name had never really sat me well. First of all, spiders are by most people (and yes, I'm one of them) not the most attractive animals. Also, they don't really connect with 'ground', and grounding is the main purpose of my footwear. So, time passed, questions went around to friends and family. A Vipassana (10-day meditation retreat) went passed and still. Nothing. No huge inspiration for another, better brand name that really connects to the spirit of the shoe.

And then, one evening in September last year, when I didn't feel that great and my friends went to the local market, one of them said "you probably don't feel good for a reason, stay at home and chill". I made myself a fire and started reading a book. Not uncommon, I got distracted within minutes. This time, there was some inspiration bubbling up for another name. I can truly not tell where Earth Sole came from, but when it was there, it was there. Also the logo, and as an artist and a huge lover of design and prettiness (have you noticed yet? ;) ), a nice logo was important to me. I liked something tribal, but also something vertical/long. Dots and lines. That had also been difficult with "Anansi the spider". Believe me, I had tried it all.

People who know me, know that Australia has always been that country for me. And so, I started looking for Aboriginal symbols and there it was. Journey of a resting place. I couldn't have named it better. Grounding. Earthing. Resting. The sign the Aboriginals to show others where this resting place was, was long, tribal, was purely dots and lines.

Journey with resting place - Aboriginal Signage

There was no questioning around. No "you like this name?", "Shall I perhaps try to change it a bit to this or that?", neither any wondering about the logo. Earth Sole was the name, the sign became the logo and that was that. It had landed, arrived, never to be changed again. Thank you for reading, and being part of the start of our journey. ••• Anouk Anansi, Founder of Earth Sole •••