Material Matters: Vulcanised Rubber Sole Construction

A world without good rubber would be a world without sneakers. People have used natural rubber for many thousands of years, but on its own the tree juice doesn’t cut it for the daily abuse of the shoe sole. There were plenty of attempts to mix additives into or process natural latex and create a superior compound, but it wasn’t until the mid-nineteenth century that a couple of clever minds came upon our modern day method – after that it didn’t take long before the vulcanised sneaker established its place in the annals of footwear history.