UN/TIED SHOES
Un/tied Shoes is an interactive story about Evie Ruddy’s experience growing up genderqueer, having never quite felt like a girl or a boy. Produced in conjunction with the National Film Board of Canada, this project presents as a seemingly real e-commerce website for a new brand of shoes. Visitors arrive on the landing page where they must decide to browse shoe styles by choosing “men” or “women”, a common fashion industry barrier regularly faced by non-binary people. Instead, regardless of which choice is selected, visitors will find the same 9 shoes. Each shoe product detail page contains a chapter in Evie’s first-person account of self-actualization.
With Evie as our guide, Un/tied Shoes invites us to question deeply rooted social and gender codes, encouraging a future where the fashion industry offers more options, fewer labels and an inclusive experience so that all people can have an outward expression that reflects how they feel on the inside.
My role in this project involved concepting, creating the fictional shoe company’s brand, designing the custom e-commerce website, and art directing the original video and photography. Visit the site at untied.shoes
Awards and Recognition
Columbia University Digital Dozen - Breakthroughs in Storytelling Award
Canadian Screen Award Nominee - Best Production, Interactive
Cleveland International Film Festival - Official Selection
Featured on Global TV and CBC Radio
Social Marketing
To market the project, we created a series of Facebook ads, reels, and Instagram stories that advertised what appeared to be a legitimate online shoe store. We also encouraged viewers to share their shoes using an Instagram hashtag, which would automatically display the photos on the website.
Credits: Produced for the National Film Board of Canada by Nicolas Klassen, Written by Evie Ruddy, Project Manager Jasmine Pullukatt, Developer We the Collective, Photographer Lauren Zbarsky, Executive Producer Robert McLaughlin.