Waterproof footwear application

Abstract

A waterproof article of footwear, comprising an upper consisted of one or more cut-shaped portions of a flexible waterproof material and a sole coupled to said upper, characterized in that said upper is assembled by stitches applied between peripheral edges of said cut-shaped waterproof material portions, said stitches being covered with a waterproof coating able to couple to said stitches and said upper according to a closeness relationship to each other; and a method of manufacture thereof.

Description

CROSS REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATION[0001]This application claims priority under 35 U.S.C. §119 to Italian Application No. IT / MC2007U000002 filed Jan. 18, 2007, and entitled “WATERPROOF FOOTWEAR” the entire contents of which are hereby expressly incorporated by reference.FIELD OF INVENTION[0002]The present invention relates to an article of footwear and particularly a waterproof article of footwear, and a method of manufacture thereof.BACKGROUND OF INVENTION[0003]Several types of articles of footwear are known in the art, which are made in different ways according to the intended use and the aesthetic features required by the manufacturer. There are different methods of manufacture also in the field of waterproof articles of footwear; they can consist of materials as leather or hide, cloth or the like, which are made waterproof by appropriate substances which are applied or impregnated. Furthermore, articles of footwear can be made directly by molding a waterproof material such as...

AI Technical Summary

Benefits of technology

[0025]Therefore, this method enables to use extremely light and flexible materials, resulting in a substantial reduction of the volume occupied by the article of footwear when it has to be put away. As it is apparent from FIGS. 6A to 7D, a boot made according to the present invention has a substantially reduced size once it is wrapped; the use of the ribbon-like member 4 connected to the free end of the leg portion of the boot as blocking means of the boot in the wrapped configuration of FIGS. 7A to 7D appears to be even more convenient.

Problems solved by technology

A major problem relates to the effective waterproofing ability, that is the actual waterproofness of the article of footwear; while testing the waterproofing ability, the critical issue is substantially embodied by the stitches of the article of footwear, because they are mostly subject to infiltrations.

It is apparent that the article of footwear could be assembled in different ways, that is by gluing or hot-welding, or they can even be made integrally; however, it is likely apparent that all these solutions lead to problems which are difficult to be solved.

Gluing or hot-welding the parts causes the article of footwear to become weak, mainly against those stresses whose application directions are different from the connection face of the parts.

Instead, the integrally-formed article of footwear leads to problems of flexibility and adaptability to the feet of the user, since it can have a typically approximate morphology; however, in the case of articles of footwear which are high in height such as boots, ankle boots and the like, the damage is likely to occur in the region intended to the articulation of the ankle, where it is exposed to the greatest stress.

Images