A Note From Ryan and Sabrina Shaffer
Hillsboro Beach, FL

Born in Taipei City and raised in Asia, we spent summers and winter holidays at our beach house in the Town of Hillsboro Beach, Florida. Just three miles long and less than a quarter mile wide, this one-road township is where The Shaffer Family, relatives and friends gathered each year, taking time from our busy lives, to relax and enjoy each other’s company.

Our immediate family – our folks and us siblings – is a family of innovative shoemakers. Over the past few decades, our family business has set precedents in various areas of the footwear industry: establishing one of the first successful foreign-invested joint ventures in China in the early 1980’s, producing over 30,000 pairs a day for brands like Nike, Asics, Adidas and Timberland; designing mass customization processes for more affordable, luxury custom shoes; reintroducing bespoke golf oxfords to PGA & LPGA Pros; and developing fashionable, advanced medical and orthopedic footwear with doctors. In all of our shoemaking, we have strived for more innovation, better technology, and higher standards of quality.

This brings us to The Hillsboro Slipper.

Inspired by a pair of German deerskin slippers our father has owned since we opened our first factory, we began development on a collection of slip-on style loafers. All four of us Shaffers were residing full time in Hillsboro Beach at the time. We modeled one of the first slipper styles after the traditional ‘Albert’ silhouette, improving on a classic. The Hillsboro Slipper is hand-stitched; available in plush velvet and buttery-soft leathers; flaunts hand-finished leather outsoles and quilted, full leather sockliners. And the best part is you can add your own personal style by customizing the materials and designing your own embroidery.

You could say this shoe was a bit of an indulgent project for us, as halfway through development we still weren’t quite sure where to place it. We thought about adding it to our custom Otabo line, and even offered it to a few other footwear brands wanting to add slippers to their collection. But in the end, we went back to what had inspired us in the first place – the pair of slippers our father wore during our leisurely vacations in Hillsboro Beach – and let the shoe itself establish a new brand: Hillsboro.

So we are happy and excited to introduce to you the first shoe in our new collection, and sincerely hope you enjoy this revamped classic. The Hillsboro team has more styles in the works, so please feel free to get in touch with your suggestions. We’d love to hear from you.