This month,we spoke to Maurice Mousserie, the owner of Moulded Shoe Inc. at 10 E. 39th Street.
Ask a New Yorker: How long have you had the store?
Maurice : I’ve been here since 1979 but the store has been here since 1942. It’s been awhile!
Ask a New Yorker: What makes your shoes so special?
Maurice : First of all, we fit feet. It’s not always the shoes, it’s how to fit them. That’s the most important thing. We can fix any feet. In other words, we have ready-made shoes that have width, length, & depth. If we can’t fit a particular foot we make the shoes custom-made. We take the cast of the foot, we make the actual foot, a mold, out of plaster of paris and then we build the shoes over any style you want. And then you get perfect fit and perfect style. Simple.
Ask a New Yorker: Do you work with doctors or podiatrists?
Maurice : Yes, we work with hospitals and special surgeons. We have many doctors that send their patients over here, for orthopaedic and all kinds of adjustments to their feet. We balance their feet.
Ask a New Yorker: Who else do you work with, besides walk-in customers?
Maurice : We do shows, lots of Broadway shows. For Titanic we made like 32 pairs of custom-made shoes because that style of shoe doesn’t exist anymore, like the ones in the time of the Titanic, around 1929. We made shoes for Hairspray, too. Many shows on Broadway.
Ask a New Yorker: What kind of shoes are you wearing?
Maurice : Alden Shoes, the best shoes in America, maybe the world. They are from Massachusetts, owned by one great family. They dedicate themselves to making high quality shoes, the old fashioned way, the best way, and they keep on doing it….and raising the price…but they don’t lower the quality. The owner is about 84 years old, I’m guessing, and he says “keep raising the price but don’t lower the quality”. And he’s right.
Ask a New Yorker: Where are you from originally?
Maurice : I’m a Lebanese Jew, but I’m here in New York many many years. I started as an employee of this store, and then the previous owner just had to hand it to me. Now I have a son who is going to take over some day. We’ll be here another 25 or 30 years for sure.
Ask a New Yorker: You make your landlord happy?
Maurice : You know how it is, I’m old fashioned. We pay the rent on time and we’re happy, we’re fine. New York needs to keep this kind of small business. We can’t just give everything to malls and big shopping centers and all that nonsense. People need a personal touch, which we really give them. We give them real personal attention, to their feet. It’s their feet that are important!
Ask a New Yorker: Do you ever wear flip-flops?
Maurice : (laughs) No! I would never! I don’t think I could because this lets your feet do whatever they want to do, and in a way, we have to control our own feet if we want to live longer and not start crippling by age 65. The healthiest thing for feet is walking on sand. And if you look at cultures that walk barefoot on the sand, they are the healthiest. But if you want to hit the pavement of New York City with flip-flops, go ahead, but it’s not a good idea. Maybe for a half-hour, but more than that is not healthy at all. Wear them for a half-hour for the style, but that’s all. You need good arch support so you don’t collapse. You see those high-heels all the time. It’s just not a healthy thing to do for young women. They reach an age where they lose the tissue on the ball of their foot because they wore high-heels and the weight of the body is not distributed right. The right heel for women is about an inch and a half. That’s perfect. If you go higher than that, you’re taking the chance that you’ll be an old lady that doesn’t walk right.
Ask a New Yorker: Back to the beach….why is it so good for feet?
Maurice : Because while you’re walking, you see there’s like 26 very small bones and if you restrict them it’s no good, but if you let them go in the sand you use every one of them and at the same time you’re walking you’re doing exercise for your heart but even more for your feet.
Ask a New Yorker: (At this point Maurice asks me if I want to see a very old piece of equipment that no other shoe maker owns. He takes me into the back of the store. Wild!)
Maurice : This is a very special machine. A lot of times people may have a corn on their foot or they have one point on their foot on the bottom of their foot where there’s a growth of some sort. So, this is a pressing machine, for example, if we have a problem in the bunion area then we take the shoes and make an impression, exactly where the bunion is, inside the shoes, inside the leather, and you will have the exact space and room you need for the bunion or for your particular problem. The shoe won’t be tight anymore and your problem is solved. This is a very old and rare machine. It’s about 120 years old. Nobody has it anymore. They only ever made about a dozen of them. They disappeared. I’m the only one who has it and I treasure it.
Ask a New Yorker: This has been a real learning experince, Maurice. Thanks so much!
