Sebastian Errazuriz, a Chilean artist who works in Brooklyn, NY, designed and made “12 Shoes for 12 Lovers” on a MakerBot Replicator 2X Experimental 3D Printer. Errazuriz talks about his design process and what 3D printing offers to future generations of artists and designers.

There once was an honest shoemaker. You might even find this shoemaker too honest if you ever kissed him, because he makes shoes inspired by former lovers. The Heartbreaker has an arrow through the back. The Boss has brass knuckles underneath and a true stiletto heel. The heel of the Jetsetter is an airplane. On the Gold Digger, it’s a classical figure like Atlas, holding up the woman who would wear it.

The shoemaker made 12 shoes for 12 lovers on his MakerBot Replicator 2X Experimental 3D Printer. Then he sanded, primed, and painted them, and brought them to Miami Beach for Art Basel, the international art fair. But you can’t walk away in the Boss or the Jetsetter just yet, since he’s only made one of each.

Shoemaker, Designer, Artist

The shoemaker’s name is Sebastian Errazuriz. He straddles the worlds of design and fine art. Before he made shoes, Errazuriz pastured a live cow on the roof of a skyscraper, created a wooden cabinet inspired by a porcupine, and planted a tree in the middle of the National Stadium in Santiago, Chile. Errazuriz grew up in Chile but now works in Brooklyn, NY, in an airy studio a few blocks north of the MakerBot factory.

At the Studio

We visited Errazuriz’s studio as he was preparing “12 Shoes for 12 Lovers.” The MakerBot Replicator 2X finds itself in the company of much larger machines for carving wood and milling metal, as well as a wall full of hand tools. But as Errazuriz says in the video, a 3D printer, like any tool, is a means to an end. “At the end of the day it all goes back to ideas: What do you want to say? What do you want to contribute? What do you want to solve?”

Even Errazuriz cannot expect to solve the age-old mystery of how men and women get along. But he joins a long line of artists who try to make sense of their relationships, whether on a canvas, in bronze, or, now, in a 3D printed shoe.