Our Story
RockDove was created for five birdwatchers of the Los Angeles Audubon Society in 2002. They were our customers, when we weren't yet a slipper company, but a beachside workshop in Santa Monica, California that resoled hiking boots. For fifteen years we protected the feet of avid adventurers as they trekked punishing terrains across southern California's mountains and deserts. As their local shoe cobbler, when customers had footwear needs, they came to us. And over time they asked for something that was badly missing, not in their time conquering the outdoors but in their lives at home—quality indoor shoes to console their high-mileage, trail-weary feet. So for Christmas that year, we handmade five pairs of slippers for our long time Audubon customers using a low-cut boot last.
The Experiment
Shoe brands in southern California, where sunny beaches and flip flops rule, don't pay much attention to slippers. So we had little to build on. However, we did know how to make comfortable, long lasting footwear. Using mattress memory foam, gel insoles, anti-shock cushioning from hiking boots, and more, we designed slippers with the goal of comforting extremely tired feet. Two months later when we sent out a newsletter about our little experiment, customers responded with 350 mail orders. We named our slippers after the most mundane bird we knew, the rock dove (pigeon) often seen strutting the boardwalks of Santa Monica Pier. They’re a memento of where we’re from and what we represent.
Inspired by Adventure, Made for the Everyday
To this day our legacy of creating footwear as if for the most exhausted, adventure-wearied feet lives on. But adventure isn’t always hanging on a rope off the side of a mountain. Everyone lives their own version of it, every single day. We make slippers so that anyone who’s on their feet all day—not just passionate outdoorsmen but teachers, chefs, nurses, cashiers, traffic cops, postal workers, and more—can count on switching into the world’s most comfortable slippers once they get home.
The Sweet Spot Comfort Level
Our quest to get comfort down to a science pushed us to become one of the earliest adopters of high-density memory foam in slippers. In 2004, we reached out to local sleep experts at the Long Beach Mattress Company to source their memory foam toppers, which we then molded into insoles. But mattress comfort didn't exactly translate to slipper comfort. So we obsessively tweaked the density and firmness ratings of our foams to create that “sweet spot” level: one that offers incredible comfort, yet not so much cushioning that you’ll feel like walking in quicksand. Today, at the heart of each RockDove slipper is a multilayered foam construction—a 40-70D memory foam pressure-mapped to every part of the plantar aspect, a support foam that adds firmness, and an anti-shock EVA layer.
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