Magento 1.9 Attributes – Difference Between Filterable with Result and Filterable with No Result in Magento Attributes

As I said, solution was quite easy once I realized what the problem was.

I followed this Magento Wiki to setup attributeSets and attributes, only I didn't realize my attributes had to be of 'int' backend-type to be eligible for layered navigation.

So, in order to create an attribute for layered navigation you must have into consideration:

• Frontend-type must be price, select or multiselect

• Backend-type must be decimal (like price), int (for selects), varchar (for multiselect). There's no need to worry about this unless you are, like me, creating attributes programmatically.

• That it must be marked as 'use in Layered Navigation'

• That there should be at least two products with different values for this attribute (this seems to be not mandatory, but gives sense to use the attribute in Layered Navigation)

Basically you need a way to remove some filters from the given categories from the admin panel. It can be done either by some improved layered navigation extension or just be using category layout updates.

Open the category edit page, switch to the "Custom Design" tab, and put the code in the "Custom Layout Update" field

<reference name="catalog.leftnav"> 
    <action method="unsetChild"><alias>shoes_size_filter</alias></action>
</reference>