Sneakers and sandwiches -A family collaboration in Santa Rosa

SANTA ROSA, Calif. - We affectionately refer to this father-son collaboration as sneakers and sandwiches.  It is a collaboration truly about love, with that side of teasing that is so often found in a family.

Lou and his son Dominic spend their days very differently.

Lou Chambrone owns and runs Canevari's Deli in Santa Rosa. 

"We're not just a deli, we're a café," explains Lou, "We're catering; we do all kinds of food." 

The deli serves sandwiches, pasta and food he describes as having a Southern Italian flair.

"It is not authentic," says Lou, "when people say that authentic, I do not know what authentic means." Instead, he says, "It's me, Lou…it's the way I like things to taste."

Dominic Chambrone creates custom shoes and clothes. His business is expanding and is known now as The Surgeon, but since shoes are where he started, for many he is known as the Shoe Surgeon.

"I’ve sold a pair for $250,000," says Dominic, "I'm going to sell a pair this year for $4 million."

He lives in Los Angeles and his work has captured the attention of well-known celebrities. 

"It took me to go build these shoes and create a name and find something so passionate that now I mean, now I make shoes for LeBron and Odell Beckham and Drake and Kanye West, like you name the person I’ve done shoes for them," says Dominic

Two very different lives but a tie that binds are their roots, which run deep here in Santa Rosa. 

"Four of my boys grew up here," says Lou, "We raised them here. My wife and I raised them here. They went to school here." 

For Dominic, "It's where I grew up. It's where my mentors were, it's where my family's from."

Here in Santa Rosa Dominic found his passion and says from young age, Dominic knew he was searching for something else. 

Dominic says his cousin let him wear the original 1985 Jordans.

"And that was the year when Michael Jordan came out with the Jordan One with Nike…I wore those to my freshman year of high school and all of my friends and peers saw them, and they welcomed me. They're like, ‘yo, cool shoes, cool shoes.’ And that feeling made me feel good because I was always very I was very introverted and not shy and quiet…I didn't know how to connect with people."  

Dominic says having a cool pair of shoes made that easier.  

In a North Bay shoe repair shop, he found a mentor in custom boot maker Michael Anthony.  He says it was amazing to see how passionate Anthony was about the craft saying, "that’s what I want to do with sneakers."  

Anthony says, "I knew he was going to be a superstar. Absolutely."

Even as his career grew, Dominic says he leaned on Anthony for creative idea and material. 

"This is the first place where I was doing Will.I.Am and I came to him. I said, ‘I need some pink material’ and. He pulled out this, like, blush pink ostrich material. He said, 'I have this. Can you use that?’ And I said, ‘yes, perfect.’" 

The North Bay fed Lou’s passions too. After a lifetime in the restaurant business, he took over this deli 12 years ago. It was struggling, but it turns out the recipe for success was to make this "authentically Lou."

"When I started to do that, people started responding. People started coming in. And then after about eight months. Well, maybe I'm on to something here," said Lou.

They are two different men, two different lives but when these two sit down you see the mutual admiration nurtured that has grown through the years.

Lou smiles saying he realized when Justin Bieber wanted 15 pairs of Dominic’s shoes.

"Oh, wow, maybe he's on to something," he said.

For Dominic, he has reflected on the efforts of his parents. 

"I got to see how hard they work to provide for their family, to create a life, and to just show that they can try something. I think it's important for this world like you just got to try," Dominic said.

And so on the day we met up with them, Dominic gave his dad something he has never given him before, a custom pair of shoes.

Dominic says every part is about his dad and the deli.

"The checkerboard, the colors, you know, the greens to match my dad's handwriting. If you noticed all the signs out front, he loves handwriting and everything the C for Canaveri. The colorway the authentic Italian colors."

In turn, his dad gave him something that is always authentically Lou: a good meal.

Sneakers, ravioli and family. It’s hard to think of a better collab than that.