We are an incredulity of atheists, living in Berlin and furiously dedicating our days to not believing in god. Ok, that's not true; we barely ever think about god, let alone about being atheists.
But, when one of us had the peculiar idea to make a handmade ‘atheist shoe’, we thought that sounded rather endearing and fun. And when the idea went gangbusters on reddit.com, we decided we had to roll up our sleeves and make the atheist shoe a reality.
Not only did we feel this could be a nice, understated way for people to profess their godlessness, but we also fell for the bauhausy, 1930s look of the shoes and we thought they’d be a welcome antidote to the cheap, samey designs belched out by the big sneaker corporations.
So we refined the designs and developed a plan of action – a couple of us as shoemakers, a couple as designers, one lending marketing experience, another her knowledge in textile production and one chap his genius at making sandwiches. And, soon, we were ready to take the atheist shoe to Kickstarter.
In 4 amazing weeks, thanks to the kindness of some wonderful people who took a chance and believed in us, we raised nearly $60,000 and had all the money we needed to produce our first batch.
The next step was to link up with some shoe-making friends in Guimaraes, Portugal, who had a workshop and a little machinery to help us meet all the demand for shoes. And now, after 8 weeks of eating a little too much pastel de nata and working to adapt the horribly slow shoe-making methods of our Berlin studio to the quicker pace of the Portuguese workshop, our humble and somewhat naive attempt to launch a handmade shoe business has culminated in a room full of 100s of shoes, in all manner of colours... and this website, where we hope to sell some.
Whether you're an atheist looking to tickle the world with a foot-first declaration of godlessness, or someone who's just keen on the aesthetics and craftsmanship of our shoes, we really do hope you'll enjoy them. And we can't wait to hear what you think!
The ATHEIST team in Berlin, May 31st, 2012
