How I Dyed My Leather Boots

by kendallthegirl

9.5K68

Intro: How I Dyed My Leather Boots

For Halloween, I wanted to dress up as Leeloo Dallas from the movie The Fifth Element. If any of you have seen the movie, you know that the costume is somewhat of a challenge. I found it wasn't that hard to piece together, tho. I made the suspenders out of duct tape, and the wig and pants were bought on ebay. My real problem came when I went looking for combat boots. Boots can be rather expensive and I'm kinda poor. To keep this as low budget as possible, I considered the Army Surplus Store. But the cheapest pair I could find wasn't all that cheap, and the look was a little off. I ended up trying my luck with the thrift stores in San Francisco's Mission District. That's where I came across a pair of steel toed Doc Martins that were absolutely perfect... aside from one minor detail: they were bumble bee yellow. Yuck! I decided to buy them (for only 10 freaking dollars) and dye them black to go with my costume. This is the photo chronicle of how my ugly yellow boots became the butt-kicking black boots I used to transform into Leeloo Dallas.

8 Comments

JoeI2 9 years ago

Well done! I used this method to dye a pair of boots I bought for $10 on e-bay that wear new and worth $150, but natural tan. I needed black. Thanks they came out well.

MistyEE 12 years ago

wow...those turned out quite nice! Love the costume too

kendallthegirl 13 years ago

Thanks Kathy!!! Hopefully the judges will look at my blurry, dark photos and take pity on me :D

cyoquelet 13 years ago

Fabulous! Did dye last? I want to dye a leather bag...

kendallthegirl 13 years ago

Thank you!!! I wanted to add notes to the photos but I'm having technical problems :/

SicilianMafia 13 years ago

You're costume came out beautifully.
"Leeloo Dallas Multi-Pass"