The history behind the style. The Wabasha Collection is named after the town of Wabasha, MN. The town lies about thirty miles downstream from Red Wing. During the early years of the Red Wing Shoe Company, the river was one of the ways the company shipped their shoes to upper Midwest merchants. At Wabasha, the Mississippi River runs swift & rugged, not content to flow in a predictable channel. It took a skilled boatman to pilot & navigate his steamboat up & down the ever changing river channel between Red Wing & Wabasha.