DIY shoe covers

Recycle leftover conference bags into useful cycling rain gear

Anybody who attends conferences usually has goody bags to bring home. Amanda usually donates her bags to Goodwill, but the bag from her latest trip was made of vinyl, "just right for raincovers for cycling."

She writes:

"I drew the pattern based on my favorite winter shoes, but they will fit over my Keen sandals too. Those spandex type covers sold to cyclists may look slick, but when you take them off all muddy and wet they wad into a stiff ball."

"I did make the bottom pieces bigger by sewing together scraps. Then I took apart the bag to salvage the vinyl piping to use to stiffen the top of shoe covers. I had velcro salvaged from another clothing item to sew on the ends so they would close over my heels. Both piping and vinyl were easy to sew on my machine.

"It only took me 3 hours to sew them up which gives me about $7.50 an hour given the price of the cheapest rain booties I could have ordered from Campmor, but no one else was paying me for my time yesterday and I didn't have to wait for them to be shipped.

"They have a clunky charm and the asymetrical color combo is stylish. The gap between pants and raincovers won't matter too much because the flair of the pant cuffs seems to keep the rain off. And this way there will be some ventilation. Poor ventilation is the biggest complaint about rain booties. For traction I may run a line of Shoe Goo across the bottoms."

Photos and narrative seen at Earthworm's Flickr photostream and used with her kind permission.

Greetings to Makezine visitors. Other Cyclelicious DIY:

• Build a ski bike.
  
• DIY Bike fenders.
  
• Bicycle iPod charger (from MAKE).
  
• DIY glowing ground effects for your bike.

Some uber-geeks may especially appreciate the bike search page. Type "DIY" in the search box and see what you find.

Tags: diy, shoe, raincover, raingear, gear, cycling