The strong smell of fresh paint tickles sophomore Amanda Niccum’s nose as she mixes gray and white paints with her brush. Maintaining a steady grip on her pair of white leather sneakers, she clears her mind of all other thoughts except the butterfly she is painting.
“I do it all myself,” Niccum said. “People don’t realize how much effort goes into painting a pair of shoes.”
When a friend asked her to paint a pair of old shoes, Niccum decided to take advantage of her artistic talent and created her own business called Niccustoms, where she hand paints shoes and sells them through Etsy and Instagram @niccustoms.
“I paint simple designs that most people can wear everyday,” Niccum said. “The shoes with the drips, for example, can be worn with any outfit.”
She has six premade designs on her Etsy store, but she also takes custom requests. She works with customers to come to an agreement on which shoes, designs and colors they want.
She takes a total of eight hours to customize each pair of shoes, and every order is packaged in matching wrapping paper and a custom card.
“My dad is really into art and different creative things,” Niccum said. “He helped me with everything, gave me ideas and showed me how to do everything the right way. He helped me get to where I am now.”
Niccum’s interest in art started at a young age. Her dad recently introduced her to airbrushing, which is a painting technique that utilizes an airbrush to spray acrylic paint. She also uses a special leather paint from a brand called Angelus.
She makes stencils using a Cricut machine, measures and tapes the shoes, mixes a fabric medium with her paints and dries it with a hair dryer. Once it is dry, she paints another layer and coats the shoes with an acrylic finisher and a shoe protector spray.
Amanda currently has 14 pending orders, and the average price of shoes range from $100 to $150. She also paints old shoes for lower prices, ranging from $35 to $50.
“I give the shoes a 10 out of 10 because if you look, she pays close attention to detail,” senior Taylor Rose said. “I know I could never do anything close to what she did for me. It’s impressive.”
Several makeup artists and Vans fan accounts have recognized Niccum on her Instagram account, which currently has over 7,000 followers. In the distant future, she hopes to receive enough orders to make Niccustoms her full-time job with multiple staff members.
“I would honestly love to do this as a job because it’s something that I enjoy doing,” Niccum said. “Right now I’d like to keep the business as it is, but I’d like to keep doing this in the future.”
TCHS School Newspaper