Over the past year there has been someone who has slowly made an impact by offering his skill set to sneaker customizers. You may have seen his work adding to the details in projects by JBF Customs, Dank Customs, Mache and more. That someone is Pedro of Absolelute.com. Even though you may be familiar of his work on tongue tags and lace locks Pedro has been taking mostly white sneakers and covering them with extremely detailed laser engraved images for years. Now he is stepping up the offering by providing a full package customization for one of the most unique experiences you can find in the custom sneaker market. We knew it was time to gain more insight about Absolelute, check our convo below:
PaintOrThread: Nike brought lasering to the limelight in their products in 2003 on an AF1 and continued to use it on other leather shoes. Did this have any influence on your getting into lasering? When did you get started? Were shoes the medium to start or did they come into the picture later?
Absolelute: Nike was a huge influence to the birth of Absolelute in 2006. From the beginning we knew sneakers will be our main medium.
I’m certain not many people know the science behind the lasering process..or the machine used. Of course we could all google but in a “layman’s” terms what is the basis of your process to complete a lasered shoe from the shoe selection, brainstorming, to using the laser machine? Whats the technical term for the machine..lol?
Through our many years of experience, we’ve realized that the best results come from white leather sneakers. When brainstorming on a new project we tend to look for sneakers that will give us the best results. Of course, if the client asks for a specific shoe, we work around that. Most people call it a laser cutter, laser etcher, or just laser.
How long did it take to perfect what areas of sneakers you can laser?
We started with shoes, and after 7 years, still learning.
Lately I’ve seen your lasering on a few different sneaker customizers work, namely JBF Customs, adding to his attention to detail. Who was the first sneaker customizer you worked with? Who are some of the others and what pairs?(I can find pics)
The first customizer we’ve collaborated with is abstrk a miami graffiti writer, this was back when we were in Miami. Once in New York, I met Mache about a year ago at DunkXChange, just walked up to him and introduced myself and what I do, and the rest is history. Mache has opened more doors than we can count! Huge thanks to him again! It’s led to several other customizers like JBF, Dank, El Cappy and many others.
Looking at your gallery you’ve done a lot of work that in it’s own right is a complete custom sneaker. What are some of those that have stuck out or been a cool project to be involved with…or that you are proud to show off?
Most definitely, the Katz Deli Absolelute experience has been our proudest, and most labor intensive project! The Gucci 3s by Dank Customs is a favorite. Another cool project was the King’s Pride Lebron 11s for Daweezy of Flight club NY, it’s our first Lebron, and the results were amazing. The Dank Lebron championship shoe was another very proud moment for us, since we’re from Miami and love supporting our team!
