Highest comfort and quality at the best price

Wool2fit emerged from the work of developing even better and more comfortable wool shoes, with higher quality, better fit, and more beautiful designs.

My name is Thomas Glerup, and I founded Wool2fit with an investor in 2003. I co-founded Glerups A/S with my parents in 2003 and Betterfelt with its own hand-felted production in Nepal in 2007.

It was my mother who, (at our home), discovered that wool is a fantastic material for making shoes. Wool has an amazing ability to absorb and release moisture, keeping the skin dry and warm. The lanolin in the wool even protects it from dirt and odor, so you can go barefoot in your wool shoes without them developing a bad smell.

It feels like the old days now, and much has changed since I started our mission to get Danes to wear wool shoes. Glerups wool shoes were slippers with a leather sole for indoor use, and slippers were something only old people wore. But, precisely because of wool's comfort, sales grew naturally through word-of-mouth recommendations, and since then, most people have discovered why wool is the best material to wear.

Wool2fit is therefore my third company in the industry, and the ambition is to develop comfortable and sustainable footwear based on my many years of experience from over 20 years in the industry. An industry that is currently undergoing rapid development, reminding me of the digital revolution that changed graphic production in my youth in the advertising industry.

The Future and Ambitions

Right now, we are at the beginning of a new revolution in design and production in the shoe industry. 3D and AI are accelerating the design process at rocket speed, while production is being transformed by printers and new materials.

We embrace this development with great enthusiasm, with a sharp focus on what we want to achieve.
First and foremost, we want to offer you beautiful, healthy, and comfortable footwear.
New technology can help us achieve more beautiful designs and better, cheaper production, but there are qualities we cannot replace with technology. Namely, wool's excellent and natural properties, and therefore we build on both millennia-old experiences and the latest knowledge.

Wool2fit is just the first modest step in this direction. We first wanted to improve the fit of our shoes so that we can offer shoes that fit our customers, instead of finding customers who fit our shoes. A wider toe box and three different last widths, so everyone can find a shoe that provides that familiar hug, without deforming our feet and harming our gait and musculature.

We are in full swing developing new types of shoes based on wool uppers and natural rubber soles. We want to go much further with our footwear than just slippers, and we have taken the first steps. We hope you will join us.

Sincerely,

Thomas Glerup Kristensen

Founder of Wool2fit and owner of the operating company Dialogo.dk

About wool and why we use wool.

We use wool primarily from sheep.
But wool can also come from other animals, including cashmere and mohair from goats, qiviut from musk oxen, angora from rabbits, and other types of wool from camels. The famous Merino wool comes from Merino sheep, which are specially bred to produce a lot of fine wool.

Wool is thus a natural material that can be harvested naturally and returned to the natural cycle.

“Self-cleaning” biology

Wool consists of protein along with a small percentage of lipids. In this respect, it differs chemically from the more dominant textile, cotton, which is mainly cellulose.

A wool fiber consists of protein (keratin) and the fiber is covered by small overlapping scales. All of this is covered on the outside by the epidermis (epicuticula), a layer of lanolin (fat) from the hair follicle. This makes the surface of the fibers water-repellent and resistant to odor and dirt, even though they are permeable to water vapor.

This is why your wool sweater and your wool shoes can be worn directly on the skin without developing a bad smell. Lanolin even develops a weak soap-like substance when it comes into contact with water.

Why does wool shrink?

The scales play a special role when washing woolen textiles, as they cause the wool to contract when wet. The scales spread, and the fibers intertwine. If the fabric is rubbed at the same time, the fibers felt together, causing the wool to shrink and become thicker and stiffer. This ability can be used to shape wool in 3 dimensions, such as a wool shoe.

That is also why wool should be washed by hand or on a wool program in the machine.

Wool can wrinkle when damp, but is easily smoothed out if the garment is hung to dry or pressed and fixed in a specific shape with moist heat (press folds and pleats)

In addition to good insulating properties and good spinning ability due to crimp, flexibility, and elasticity, wool has many other advantages.
For example, wool can absorb up to approx. 35% moisture without feeling wet and will still feel warm because it contains a large amount of insulating air.
Wool even has a thermostatic property. When wool absorbs moisture, for example from humid air, heat is generated, and when the wool releases the moisture again into dry air, heat is consumed (the wool has a cooling effect).

Durability

Wool weighs very little, compared to, for example, leather, and it is one of the most durable fibers known. It can withstand tearing, and it can be bent more than 20,000 times without breaking. (Cotton breaks after 3,200 bends, silk after 1,800 bends, and rayon fibers break after only 75 bends.)

It is also the most resilient fiber, because it has a natural crimp that helps it maintain its shape. Wool fibers can be stretched and still bounce back to their original shape.

That is why wool is so suitable for clothing, and why felted wool shoes are so light and durable.

Wash with caution!

Wool is sensitive to alkaline solutions. If the wool contains lanolin (like our wool shoes), it is often best to simply air the wool in damp weather. In general, it is important that the wool has the opportunity to dry completely between uses. If you wear your wool shoes daily, we therefore recommend that you buy several pairs and alternate between them every day.
Most wool, however, can be washed gently at low temperatures with special soap or dry cleaned.

In this way, you can preserve and enjoy the softness and natural properties of wool.

Does wool itch and prickle?

Modern technology can clean and spin wool into very fine and soft qualities that absolutely do not itch or prickle. Wool that is not carbonized and has been treated correctly is the best clothing nature has bestowed upon us.

Mishandled wool often itches, smells, and is difficult to maintain.

Wool's tendency to shrink has led to the development of various chemical treatments. These usually use chlorinated chemicals to remove the fiber's scaly outer surface. This is then replaced with a synthetic coating that makes the wool more resistant to temperature changes. It also makes it less prone to felting or shrinking. In short, the fibers are made machine washable.
The downside is that the wool loses some of its other properties and the process pollutes.

Carbonization is another chemical process used to remove vegetable matter (VM) from wool. VM, which can be seeds, burrs, grass, etc., consists predominantly of cellulose, hemicellulose, and lignin, while wool is mainly protein. The carbonization process utilizes the difference in the stability of proteins and cellulose to the effects of mineral acids.
The most commonly used acid for this purpose is sulfuric acid. In its simplest form, carbonization follows a traditional wool scouring process and consists of acidification, drying, baking, mechanical crushing and dusting, neutralization, and final drying. This basic process of carbonizing loose wool has been used for many years, and it goes without saying that it can damage the fine wool fibers and break them. Broken carbonized wool fibers can feel prickly and scratchy.

Therefore, we avoid carbonized wool.

Production

We still produce in Kathmandu. Partly because we have a good network of skilled artisans in Nepal, but also because we feel an obligation to continue the work of developing and improving the production that Thomas Glerup laid the foundation for almost 20 years ago.

It is still about craftsmanship and proud traditions.
After each work process, a pair of wool shoes undergoes a quality control before being sent to the next workstation. This way, we ensure that no shoes are sent to Denmark with defects.
The process is simple. Wool shoes are a simple product made of simple and natural materials. First and foremost, wool. We use wool from New Zealand, Australia, and Tibet.
The wool is gently washed so that it still retains its natural lanolin.
Then the wool is dyed and carded. We only use approved dyes that comply with our strict Danish and European environmental requirements.
Then the wool is laid in a pattern that forms a large sock. The sock is lightly felted together with warm soapy water and elbow grease.
Now the sock is pulled onto the last that will shape the finished shoe, and the wool sock is shrunk until it fits tightly and firmly on the last. This also requires elbow grease and warm soapy water. You may know the principle if you have washed a wool sweater at too high a temperature in your washing machine.
When the wool has shrunk sufficiently, you have a firmly felted and strong wool shoe that fits perfectly on the last we have developed for our wool shoes. All our lasts have ample space for the forefoot and toes and are available in 3 widths, so that people with narrow, wide, and medium-wide feet can find a shoe that fits.
All our shoes are therefore dimensionally stable, and inside they have exactly the measurements they received from our lasts, and therefore you can also rely on our size charts when you need to find your size. We have chosen to "build" our lasts according to the German standard with a 6 mm difference between the length of the sizes. A standard that is also used in most of the EU, but shoe sizes are far from standardized, so we recommend using our size guide before choosing your shoes

The still-wet wool shoe is placed on the last to dry, and the next day, a strong latex (natural rubber) sole is attached. The sole is glued on with liquid latex, and the shoe is then pulled off the last.
The sole is sewn with a stitch along the edge for safety.
Finally, various labels are sewn on, and after a final quality check, the shoes are packed in Indian cotton bags and shipped to Denmark.

Our artisans (mostly women) can produce 2-3 pairs a day and, after a short 3-month training period, earn a salary equivalent to that of a male schoolteacher in Kathmandu. This is a relatively good salary for a female worker with such limited training. In general, Thomas Glerup, as a Danish employer in Nepal, has believed that fair payment for labor strengthens both the workers and the company. We cannot change the whole world, and the salary is still very low compared to a Danish salary. But we can ensure that our workers receive equal pay for equal work, that our employees can support themselves and their families with their wages, and we can contribute to the development and growth of wool shoe production in Nepal in the future.