Owner of the Shoelace Factory, Mike Killian, proudly shows off his 1955 braiding machine. Purchased at auction in 1988, the machine now makes shoelaces in Killian’s new Kirkwood location.
Maryanne Kuzara, a former video editor who holds a PhD, never thought she’d be spending this part of her career making shoelaces. But that was before she became acquainted with boyfriend Mike Killian through Facebook.
At the time, she had a squirrel problem in her attic.
“He claimed he could help me get rid of them, which is why we met for dinner,” she said.
During that dinner, the pair hit it off. Today, the Glendale residents aren’t just a couple; they are also part of the same business, the Shoelace Factory at 205 N. Kirkwood Road.
The enterprise, which occupies a 1,000 square-foot storefront in the municipality’s downtown section, opened in July as part of an expansion of Killian’s preexisting work at the City Museum, where he has been making distinctive shoelaces on antique machinery for two decades.
“I had bought some of these old machines at an auction in 1988 and I just had them stored,” he said. “I wasn’t going to do anything with them but I thought they were really cool because of the way they operate.”
The project became so popular, it begat the idea for a standalone location.
Killian’s braided shoelaces are available for purchase at his storefront, The Shoelace Factory at 205 N. Kirkwood Road.
“Because of where we live and our history with Kirkwood, it just seemed ideal, so we ended up putting the shop here,” said Killian, a 64-year-old former electrician. “I love Kirkwood. It really is home. The other vendors in the area and the other stores and restaurants have just been wonderful to us. The chamber has been great. The city has been great. It couldn’t have been any better.”
The couple actually lived in the same Oakland neighborhood decades ago and attended Nipher Middle School together before Kuzara moved to California.
“Across the street was a Velvet Freeze ice cream store when I was a kid,” recalled Killian. “That was our after-school hangout.”
Her recent return to St. Louis — and the aforementioned squirrels in the attic — brought the pair back in contact. Today, they work to bring shoelaces to the general public.
“We’ve got tons of material here — all different colors and patterns and sizes,” he said. “We can just put tips on it right on the spot.”
Perhaps most notably, work is often done right in front of customers, who love watching the old braiding equipment, some of which dates to the 1870s, as it works to put together laces, scrunchies, lanyards and keyrings.
Spools of brightly-colored thread are strung onto a machine and braided into unique pairs of shoelaces.
“In the Kirkwood store, we have a machine in the front window so people just walking by can stop. In fact, I want to put a little park bench out this summer so people can sit and watch it,” Kuzara said. “I’ve done a few birthday parties where girls got to come in and pick their own colors for friendship bracelets and we’d wind them right there.”
Killian said the visual aspect is all part of the appeal.
“Just walking down the sidewalk, it is going to catch your eye,” he said. “People want to come in and know a little more about what we do because they see these cords and stuff being made right in front of them.”
The store also offers handmade jewelry, headbands and leather goods among other items.
“One of the things I want people to know is that we are so much more than shoelaces,” Kuzara said. “Every time people walk into the store, they are like, ‘oh my gosh, I didn’t know you had all these other things.’”
She also noted that the operation may soon expand to include another website to boost sales in the niche area of shoelace manufacturing.
“We’re starting to get into stores in other cities and other states and my goal is to get large accounts that we’re furnishing all over the country,” she said.
Killian, who still runs the operation at City Museum, said the Kirkwood shop couldn’t exist on only shoelaces.
“It really is a niche thing,” he said. “We started out just making the shoelaces and kind of branched out into a lot of other different things.”
Today, Killian and Kuzara look forward to bigger and better achievements in the world of shoelaces.
Of course, not everything has been successful.
“We still have the squirrels,” laughed Kuzara.
