Southlake Mayor Laura Hill loves her new shoes. Not only are they painted in the traditional Carroll Senior High School green color with a dragon wrapping around the sole but also they are inscribed on the side with the words, “Together we stand. We are Southlake.”
Not to mention they were designed and hand-painted by Carroll ISD student Carolyn Teng.
“I knew they were mine the minute I saw that drawing,” Hill recalls fondly. “I picked them in like three seconds.”
But the mayor was not the only one to get their own custom-made CISD shoes. Teng and five other students gathered Tuesday evening at the Southlake Town Hall to present their hand-painted Converse shoes to the entire council. The artistic pupils were joined by their art teacher Summer Neimann who helped guide them through their shoe-painting processes.
The idea began in April when Neimann held an art competition called “The Mayor’s Shoes,” where her students would submit their own designs and the mayor would pick a winner who would have their creations produced. Hill says there were so many wonderful drawings, so she chose six runner-ups in addition to Teng’s design.
“She loved it so much that she chose all of her councilmen to get their own shoes,” Neimann states.
The students delivered the final products to the council members during their regular meeting on Tuesday, June 18. Council members observed the designs, swapped shoe sizes and smiled as they admired the hand-crafted footwear given to them by the talented art students over at CISD.
“The details are excellent,” Hill expresses. “Carolyn spent hours on these, and I will cherish them.”