An exclusive collection from shoe designer Mr Robert McCaffrey and Franz Ferdinand frontman Mr Alex Kapranos .

As Mr Robert McCaffrey began to produce a prototype of his cycling shoe four years ago, he was seized with a thought. “I was making a pair in white leather so that I could draw on them, and I kept thinking, these look like something David Byrne would wear. I am a huge Talking Heads fan and knew he always wore white shoes and that he was a cyclist, too. So I got his address, went to the post office and scribbled on a bit of foolscap paper: ‘I think you should have these.’”

Mr McCaffrey received a note back from Mr Byrne – whom he had never met. There was a picture attached of him in the shoes and an invitation to come to his concert in Glasgow.

By that point, Mr McCaffrey had already been working on his line of shoes for four years, all the while acting as a design consultant for major European fashion houses. As well as consulting on branding, he had also worked variously as a designer at Y-3, created a football boot for Nike, and a sneaker for Dirk Bikkembergs, which sold more than three million pairs. ​

His shift into cycling-shoe design came about by accident, quite literally. Cycling to the Glasgow School of Art one day to start a new job as a guest lecturer, he decided to wear a pair of leather-soled shoes. “The leather sole slipped right off the metal pedal and I cut my leg. I got a few minutes more down the road to Charing Cross [a notorious junction in Glasgow] and my foot slipped off again in the middle of the cars. I caught myself, but the soles were broken, so it was a natural response of the designer in me to think: ‘How can I improve this?’”

Mr McCaffrey wasn’t interested so much in the performance demanded by the Lycra-clad or fixie-riding cycling obsessives. He wanted, he explains, to create shoes “that unite new technology and traditional craftsmanship” – they weren’t “for cyclists, per se, but people who ride their bike”. To test his prototypes, which were traditional in style, but with a sturdy Vibram rubber pedal pad on the sole and a folding luminous tab, he needed a very particular type of cyclist. Flush from his success with Mr Byrne, he had one person in mind for this – a distant acquaintance he knew from the close-knit Glasgow art and music scene: Mr Alex Kapranos, lead singer of the band Franz Ferdinand.

He sent a pair for Mr Kapranos to try and wasn’t just rewarded with a pleasant note. “When I got them, I thought, this is someone who enjoys elegance, but also understands that you want to ride your bike,” says Mr Kapranos, in his Glasgow burr. “I loved them.” They quickly became business partners, which is how the eight-piece collection – including styles such as Derbies, desert boots and monk straps – that MR PORTER is offering, came to be. Mr McCaffrey was to be the design brains and Mr Kapranos its ambassador to the world.

On the surface, Mr Kapranos’ move into footwear might seem a big departure from his usual life. He is, after all, the archetype of the mid-2000s pop-rock star, having sold five million albums, conquered the US and picked up the Mercury Music Prize (2004), all the while becoming one of the biggest fans of the era-defining clothes of Mr Hedi Slimane (then at Dior Homme). Certainly, he had some wild times, too.

“Tours and what comes with them were hard to deal with at first. You give a kid a big bag of sweets and they will eat them all, but then they are sick and they learn,” Mr Kapranos says. “When you go on tour you have this massive opportunity to go wild, and it is sort of expected of you by the promoters. You are in these cities for just a night and you feel like you don’t have to meet expectations. You can either use that in a positive or negative way.”

These days, he’s far more pedestrian, walking and cycling around the places he winds up in when the band are on the road.

On the surface, the partnership between Mr Kapranos and Mr McCaffrey is an unlikely one. Aside from a home city and a similar taste in music, what do this rock star and footwear designer have in common? “Perfectionism,” says Mr Kapranos, “bordering on obsessiveness.”

“I was talking to Robert the other day about going to record some music in France at this studio that has exactly the same mixing gear as I have in Glasgow, and I was suddenly aware that is how Robert talks about the stitching on his shoes. Nobody who looks at the shoe or listens to the records knows the importance of those little details, but if you didn’t pay attention to them, the finished product wouldn’t be the same. It is the case for both of us.”

The finished product in this instance is made in Montegranaro, a medieval citadel in east-central Italy, which plays host to more than 200 shoemakers, including operations for global brands such as Prada and Gucci. McCaffrey uses only calf skin for its shoes because it doesn’t tear, the patina improves with age, and they allow your feet to breath – essential if you are on a bike.

Although the shoes produced here are some of the best in the world, sometimes the process is fraught with frustration, Mr McCaffrey says. “The making of them is all about supply. I want the best ingredients. If you are missing a zip or​ something, then you can’t do anything. Sometimes it is difficult, but when you have everything there, even the handmade parts can be done relatively quickly, as the workers have such skill.” That said, each shoe takes a minimum of a week-and-a-half of man hours to make from scratch.

Mr McCaffrey and Mr Kapranos’ collection – which also includes gloves and wallets made from strips of leather, with a nod to handlebar tape – is largely inspired by hand-built bicycles. “The material, the frame, the type of oil, they are all equally important. It is like they are my muse. After the wheel, man’s second greate​st invention is the bike,” says Mr McCaffrey. “The campaign we shot with Alex is all about ​the ​disconnection you feel when you ride. It is about taking a break and letting ideas come to you, about being creative,” he adds.

One thing you can’t fail to notice when you look at McCaffrey shoes is their eye-pleasing wearability. They represent a happy meeting of form and function, as comfortable in the office as they are on a night on the tiles. They are, simply put, shoes to be worn while indulging in the simple pleasures of life. And President John F Kennedy was surely correct when he said, “nothing compares to the simple pleasure of a bike ride”. Certainly Mr McCaffrey and Mr Kapranos would agree.

Shop the entire McCaffrey collection here