Palola was founded in Singapore in 2016, by 2 Singaporean craftsmen who had a shared vision to mend the broken bond between the wearer of the footwear and the shoemaker. For years, footwear brands moved away from traditional shoemaking, and started industrialising shoemaking processes. This resulted in footwear that were made by factory workers in assembly lines instead of shoemakers who understoo
d the wearers’ feet, and how to make footwear that would look good and fit well. Bespoke shoemaker Josh Leong, honed his craft at Italian bespoke shoemaker, Stefano Bemer, and currently heads the shoemaking team at Palola. Together with Jeremiah from The J.Myers Company, the founders have more than a decade’s worth of experience between them, and they set out to create a brand of footwear centred around style, but more importantly, comfort and craftsmanship.