Ian's Shoelace Site
Fun, fashion & science in the Internet's #1 website about shoelaces – and home of the Ian Knot, the world's fastest shoelace knot. If you want to lace shoes, tie shoes or learn about shoelaces – this is the place!
Welcome!
G'day everyone, Ian Fieggen here, also known as “Professor Shoelace”. I'm a real human living in Melbourne, Australia. This website has no “A.I.” content – it's all built with “H.I.” plus Human Effort over more than two decades.
Welcome to “Ian's Shoelace Site” – made by one human, for all humans.
Table of Contents
Contains over 100 × step-by-step shoe lacing tutorials, over 2,700 × shoe lacing photos, plus the interactive “Create-a-Lace” for designing your own lacing.
Contains 25 × shoelace knots (including my world's fastest “Ian Knot”), plus info on tying correctly so that they sit straight and stay securely tied – yet can be untied without jamming.
Heaps of knowledge about shoelaces, including their construction, length calculations – even what the tips are called, as well as Ian's interviews, articles, Q&As and more.
Information about this website and the site's author, Ian Fieggen – including Ian's contact details. Also info on this site's sponsors plus ways that you, too, can support Ian.
Looking for something? This website has more than 300 pages – which can be daunting to wade through! Search the whole of Ian's Shoelace Site using Google Custom Search.
Today's Photo
13-Feb-2026
Today's pic from the archives was contributed by Phillip L. in Mar-2008.
White Pacer roller skates with black & blue trim laced with blue Zipper Lacing.
Phillip also Zipper Laced his wife's roller skates.
What's New?
Updated “Interviews & Articles”
04-Dec-2025 – During Australia's marriage equality debate, PUMA engaged me to create the “Equality Knot”, then sent a film crew to shoot this “content piece” video.
02-Dec-2025 – Following a visitor request, I added diagrams for the inverted variation of Pentagram Lacing for 7, 6 and 5 pairs of eyelets.
28-Nov-2025 – Following a suggestion from a website visitor, I added buttons to filter by either “Shortening” or “Lengthening” methods.
Recent Visitor Feedback
thanks for the site it's really cool, i open it every so often :)
– Xavier P., USA, Feb-2026
Ian, you are my GOAT! I love lacing my Docs and your guide helpful. I also love that one of your interests is computer graphics. It's mine too! Please accept my token of appreciation, may it help with server costs :). Cheers, brother!
– Nikki B., USA, Feb-2026
I have mentioned you and this website for the nth time to the people around me. Have been following your site for about 16-17 years now. Now I am all grown up and can give a little back.
– Tihana R., Hungary, Feb-2026
love the ian knot, still can't believe how fast it is
– Clemens W., USA, Feb-2026
I learned the Ian knot from YouTube ~a decade ago - so thrilled to learn it came from a guy with a shoelace website. As one passionate old-school webmaster to another, please keep it up at all costs.
– Hlín Ö., Iceland, Feb-2026
People are always blown away when I show them your Ian Knot! Now that I'm a father I can teach the kids (and the wife) about your great invention. Thank you for the lesson and the lacing methods, you're the best!
– Diego M., USA, Feb-2026
If you'd also like to send feedback, please Contact Ian.