“In Amsterdam you can’t store 400 pair of shoes in the mayor’s barn!”

In Ringebu, however, there was storage space at the mayor’s. Yvette Simone La Pierre and Ed Steur looked for a little place with a lot of room and fresh air. In 2005 the couple and their two children moved to the Ringebu municipality. Here they run the shoe store La Pierre where they guarantee that you can find what you can’t find in other stores. Yvette designs their shoes and purses that are produced in Spain.

They were well established and then came up against a difficult time. One Sunday their whole shop went up in flames. The couple lost both their stock ad personal belongings and had to close the store for the winter. Now they have established themselves in a new location in the center of Ringebu.

Jeroen Oostendorp moved to Norway in 2006 with his wife Inge and two children. He runs the shoe store Vandreskoen (the traveling shoe) in Liillehammer. It specializes in walking shoes and hiking boots.

Jeroen says this as to why his family moved: “It’s something about Norway and us. The experience of having so much space with universal access rights was very special. To set up a tent in the forest gives someone a feeling of freedom.”