Baltimore ‘Shoe Muralist’ Gets National, Celebrity Attention for Custom Designs – CBS Baltimore

BALTIMORE (WJZ) – A Baltimore artist is gaining national attention for his clothes, especially his custom shoe designs.

Akio Evans is known as the ‘shoe muralist’ online and he is the artist behind the one-of-a-kind designs that have captured the attention of the film industry and celebrities. like Dr. Dre, Kevin Hart and Dave Chapelle.

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Evans has been making shoes and making clothes since he was a teenager at Northern High School in Baltimore.

“I just kept going with it and put my own spin on everything,” Evans explains.

That led him to found his own brand, Akio’s Glorious Heroes, named after his mother, Glorious Taylor, also a seamstress, who died of a heart attack in 2012.

“My mom always took something out of nothing and turned it into something,” he said.

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His signature is imprinted on the left corner of the outfit, right next to the heart. Each of his designs tells a different story.

“The way I see it, our story and our signatures are what counts the most,” says Evans. “So when we leave here, if I am no longer here, how will we be remembered if we leave our mark.”

Evans’ clothing is now on sale at The Sound Garden in Fells Point. His custom shoes are featured in an upcoming HBO series, and he’s been asked to design a costume for Will Smith on his new Peacock show airing this month.

Evans also shares a passion for the arts with people back home. For several years, he worked with Baltimore City School students, teaching them how to share their stories through art.

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“I try to always separate that you have to be a bit of a perfectionist when it comes to creating art,” he says. “Everybody is a creator in some way.”