Leah Woods

Cabinet for a Gentleman’s Shoes and Cabinet for a Ladies Shoes evolved as part of a body of shoe cabinets begun in 2006. The idea behind this body of work was to explore the function of storing and organizing shoes while displaying those shoes as valued objects at the same time. Throughout the six cabinets in the series, I explored the way women’s shoes could be organized, the shape of the space around the shoes, what other items could be organized with the shoes, and the colors the cabinets should be in order to showcase the colors of the shoes. The last pieces in the series, the His and Hers Cabinets, were my first intention specifically addressing gender and the subtleties of what would constitute a Masculine versus a feminine cabinet. My work has consistently been designed with women in mind, but until these last two shoe cabinets I had not addressed gender so directly.

The idea to begin a body of work investigating shoes and the display and organization of these objects grew out of a larger interest in the function and utility that furniture can offer. I have explored many specific items held in or organized by furniture and I continue to be inspired by the question of how a furniture form can offer a specific function or experience. I’ve built cabinets for individual pieces of jewelry, mirrors that reflect only part of the body, and desks that imagine a particular user. Currently, my interest in function has turned towards objects that offer another particular purpose for the user, such as dress forms and parasols. I am investigating how to create these objects that offer, suggest, and allude to function while approaching the line that separates functional from non- functional work.

www.leahkwoods.com