Bournemouth-based Blue Soul Customs is a global first

Harrison Alcock launched Blue Soul Customs just three months ago, but he has already seen huge international recognition, selling shoes to people in the US, Australia, Switzerland and Saudi Arabia.

His shoes are a global first – he is the first to tattoo designs onto shoes.

The business produces limited edition customisations of carefully selected shoes, Harrison, from Christchurch, said.

“We will only release maybe five of each shoe, or ten of each shoe, or 20 of each bag,” he said.

“Once they're gone, they're never made again. So these are collectibles, these are limited edition, and these are literally pieces of history at this point. Every single shoe is history being made.

“There has been not a single tattooed Dunk before. There's never been tattooed Doc Martens before, there's never been tattooed Timberlands, and there will never be tattooed Louis Vuitton’s.”

Harrison has been a tattoo artist for a decade, and worked in a studio on Charminster Road, until lockdown struck, and he lost his job as a result.

“I'm sat here like a wally thinking, what do I do?” Harrison said.

“I had a lot of experience in business from my past, so I thought, let's try and start a business.

“And originally I was just going to customize shoes, because I think it's a nice business for here in the UK, it's not so big.

“So I'm there with my arm in a sling [having dislocated his shoulder], trying to paint some shoes and forgetting that behind me is all my tattoo gear.

“It's two things that I think coincide, and I think it's brilliant. But no one had done it before.”

After some trial and error, a lot of time and ruining a number of pairs of shoes and tattoo machines, Harrison managed to make it work, with each shoe taking a day to tattoo.

The business launched on Harrison’s 30th birthday in November, and saw its 100th order last week, shipping shoes across the world, with just two being sold to people in the UK.

He has seen videos posted to his social media have millions of views and being shared by companies globally. At the moment, Harrison is doing everything himself from his home in Charminster, but he has aspirations to expand the business beyond shoes.

He said Blue Soul will be the first designer brand that sells only customised tattoo goods, worldwide.

Harrison will teach the art form and hire people in America, Switzerland, France and beyond, to have an artist in each company working for the business but giving them creative freedom.

He has also teamed up with the Smile charity, to raise money by raffling a pair of shoes to give children that can’t afford them a brand-new pair of shoes, and aims to expand the charitable side of the business in the future, too.

For more information, visit the Blue Soul Customs website.