The All-Inclusive Shoe & Boot Thread

[The Shooman]

thanks The Shooman . Good eye. Big Johnny Lobb (St. James).

Wow, how long have you had those for?

I could tell they were something really special because you don't see that type of thing much. They way they were made mainly told me they were special.

 

[Journeyman]

Big Johnny Lobb (St. James).

You hardly ever see someone post a pic of Lobb St James shoes. The jodhpur boots look very nice.

 

[shookt]

I actually do not find that jodhpurs cause cuff hangups. I get more hangups with boot pull tabs.

View attachment 33218

Impressive form - I'm still trying to decide between jodhpurs, chelseas, chukkas, and george boots. Black plain toe with goyser stitch. Leaning to george boots though. I feel like chukkas are too short, chelseas have the tab problem, and jodhpurs scare me - I don't think I have the guts to carry them.

 

[formby001]

You hardly ever see someone post a pic of Lobb St James shoes. The jodhpur boots look very nice.

That's because hardly anyone can afford them. The price of some of their bespoke is a piss-take.

 

[Lobbster]

This used to be limited to Lobb and Huntsman only, nowadays it seem to have become the norm e.g. 8k£ overcoats by people just getting started on their own.

 

[Great White Snark]

Impressive form - I'm still trying to decide between jodhpurs, chelseas, chukkas, and george boots. Black plain toe with goyser stitch. Leaning to george boots though. I feel like chukkas are too short, chelseas have the tab problem, and jodhpurs scare me - I don't think I have the guts to carry them.

Once you’re standing up and walking, there is almost zero difference in how jodhpurs and chelseas will look unless you’re wearing high water pants. Their level of formality is more or less equal too. Chukkas are a different animal with wide ranging formality and I have no idea what George boots are!

 

[shookt]

That's a good point about jodhpurs and chelseas. Here's an example of a pair of george boots (even the spurs are included). It has higher quarters and eyelets than chukkas although still not a full boot.

 

[Thruth]

On the farm we used to cut them off with a Stanley knife for just that reason>
Theres another trick on RMs if you care. Have the pull tabs taken off - then - sewn back on -down a few cm on the inside.

Saint Bernard puppies do a good job at chewing off RM pull tabs. Had two different ones eat the tabs of two different pairs.

 

[Thruth]

Wow, how long have you had those for?

I could tell they were something really special because you don't see that type of thing much. They way they were made mainly told me they were special.

they are same era as my Cleverely’s so somewhere around 2007 -2009.

 

[Thruth]

You hardly ever see someone post a pic of Lobb St James shoes. The jodhpur boots look very nice.

Thanks JM. JLSJ have yet to be co-opted by the iGent set. I think their price sets up a big barrier.

 

[Thruth]

That's because hardly anyone can afford them. The price of some of their bespoke is a piss-take.

very true.

 

[Thruth]

Impressive form - I'm still trying to decide between jodhpurs, chelseas, chukkas, and george boots. Black plain toe with goyser stitch. Leaning to george boots though. I feel like chukkas are too short, chelseas have the tab problem, and jodhpurs scare me - I don't think I have the guts to carry them.

i don’t know why people hold the opinion they jodhpurs are hard to pull off. They are a boot that as Great White Snark states look similar when you are upright. It is a no brainer.

you can find taller Chukkas from JLP and G&G for example that give you your George boo

JLP

G&G

 

[Journeyman]

Thanks JM. JLSJ have yet to be co-opted by the iGent set. I think their price sets up a big barrier.

Yes. It's years since I've read about Lobb St James, but I remember that the price was something like 5000 pounds for a pair of shoes.

Also, from memory, they don't do trunk shows, which further limits access.

 

[Lobbster]

They do actually and you can benefit from their buy 1 get 2nd half price policy. Just don't forget that the trees cost extra.

It's well known that JLSJ outsource a lot of their work, also abroad and to low cost competitors who are considerably more affordable. Just look at some of the prictures on their hompage, the results can be very lacklustre.

 

[Journeyman]

They do actually and you can benefit from their buy 1 get 2nd half price policy.

Thanks - I didn't know that. Interesting to know that they do travel. GBP7500 for two pairs of shoes is still a heck of a lot, though!

It's well known that JLSJ outsource a lot of their work, also abroad and to low cost competitors who are considerably more affordable.

If so, that's very disappointing to hear, particularly at the prices that they charge.

 

[fxh]

Thanks JM. JLSJ have yet to be co-opted by the iGent set. I think their price sets up a big barrier.

So their 3 customers are you, shooey and cromptom

 

[Pimpernel Smith]

So their 3 customers are you, shooey and cromptom

And Crompton's on a freebie. So there must be another customer. Someone who's wife doesn't now he's spending that kind of money on shoes.

 

[The Shooman]

They do actually and you can benefit from their buy 1 get 2nd half price policy. Just don't forget that the trees cost extra.

It's well known that JLSJ outsource a lot of their work, also abroad and to low cost competitors who are considerably more affordable. Just look at some of the prictures on their hompage, the results can be very lacklustre.

yeah, but they have those very experienced last makers with 25 years or more experience. They have more experience than virtually anyone in the shoemaking world because they are just focused on making lasts.

are they really low cost workers? Some of the shoes do seem lackluster.

 

[Lobbster]

Te be fair, what's true for Lobb is also true for many of the other makers, both English and continental European. I know a shoemaker who interned at Lobb and brought back many interesting stories. He said they have excellent people but just as many below average ones, so it depends if you get lucky. Due to the high demand and a lack of trainees work does get outsourced all over Europe, especially Eastern Europe.

 

[shookt]

Te be fair, what's true for Lobb is also true for many of the other makers, both English and continental European. I know a shoemaker who interned at Lobb and brought back many interesting stories. He said they have excellent people but just as many below average ones, so it depends if you get lucky. Due to the high demand and a lack of trainees work does get outsourced all over Europe, especially Eastern Europe.

Fascinating. It sounds to me like it's probably better to go directly to Eastern Europe in that case and buy shoes there that have a little more integrity no?

 

[Lobbster]

The lasts and the cutting is mostly done on the premises and ultimalty these two mostly determine how the shoes will fit and look like. Their handwork can be excellent but they can't do the lasts and styles, there is a reason Terry Moore of Foster&Sons or Teemu Leppanen of Lobb are so highly rated, it's almost an art.

 

[The Shooman]

Te be fair, what's true for Lobb is also true for many of the other makers, both English and continental European. I know a shoemaker who interned at Lobb and brought back many interesting stories. He said they have excellent people but just as many below average ones, so it depends if you get lucky. Due to the high demand and a lack of trainees work does get outsourced all over Europe, especially Eastern Europe.

There are definitely nightmare stories out there, and l know some of the nightmare stories of the famous firms are true. Some of these famous firms have treated their clients like dills and have worn out there welcome, and they have been told to get lost and never come back. The welcome has been worn out in various places because some of these firms seem to push the limit on what they can get away with, i.e, they cut corners because they seem to think the client will accept almost anything because of the big name, and in a large part they do imo. They seem to work out who they can skimp on and who they can't. They know the average client doesn't know their arm from their elbow so they take advantage of that. I promised not to tell how bad it really is. The results can be amazing with the famous firms IF one pushes them, but if they see a naive client who is wet behind the ears (most of them imo) they can deliver mediocrity.

Using piece workers can be really good because you can get real specialists that do worldclass work, but l think the client needs to demonstrate that he knows what he wants and won't accept anything less. Most clients won't do that because they don't really know what they want, so they get lesser makers IMO.

It makes me like the idea of working with an individual maker to do everything. He may not be able to make to Berluti standards or the top Japanese, but at least he will try his best and still make a great shoe. My maker is a last maker mainly ( a big deal for me) and he has worked with the top firms, and he can certainly make a very nice shoe to rival most makers imo. Frankly l would prefer to work with a guy like that with a great attitude than with a firm who's attitude sucks. Relationships are important to me. I have never had a good relationship with any of my makers except for my shirt maker, but l am feeling good about this new shoemaker.

Is Vass outsourcing, l suppose they are?
What about the high priced French makers? Their work is so worldclass. Lobb Paris is said to do their work inhouse, but what about Berluti and other top french makers?

Apparently Lattanzi have 25 workers and it seems they do things inhouse. They have a big workshop and when people visit there always seems to be a number of makers stitching the soles and last makers etc.

 

[The Shooman]

The lasts and the cutting is mostly done on the premises and ultimalty these two mostly determine how the shoes will fit and look like. Their handwork can be excellent but they can't do the lasts and styles, there is a reason Terry Moore of Foster&Sons or Teemu Leppanen of Lobb are so highly rated, it's almost an art.

Teemu is absolutely the highest of experts in lastmaking. A truly impressive man. Such a blow that Cleverley lost him.

Terry Moore trained the very lucky Emiko Matsuda as one of his students. News is that recently she has left Fosters after 20 years. Such a blow. She was a lastmaker and also head shoemaker at Fosters. She loves making shoes, and her grandmother was a clog maker. Her husband is a a maker also. Check out her work.

I think she also trained my lastmaker. Does anyone know what Emiko is doing now?

 

[The Shooman]

Church's gemming failure.

 

[shookt]

That's pretty severe - is that Bedo's channel? I'm curious to see how worn the shoes were.

 

[The Shooman]

That's pretty severe - is that Bedo's channel?

Yes.

I'm curious to see how worn the shoes were.

Of course. Look! It explains a lot.

Video on the stitchdown construction

Total Shoe Restoration | Shoes Taken Completely Apart and Put Back Together...but Better!!

In this video, we give this pair of Sebago shoes a makeover. A local customer brought these into our shop to see what we could do. They were literally fall...

www.youtube.com

I had never really given much thought about the stitchdown construction to make shoes until now. I never realised how bad it really is. It ranks higher than glued construction, but only just, and it ranks below brass screwed construction and blake construction. It is a horrible crude construction. Why? Because it has no insole so it is impossible to resole the shoe with the exact fit, and resoles are also limited because the out turned lining and upper is glued to the mid/outsole and the out turned upper is also machine sewn. The cobbler said he can make it fit exactly as before, but he was talking nonsense because there are no markings to know where to place it, as the cobbler was moving it all over the place before he glued it.

I know a local maker that does stitchdown construction for ballet shoes. It's cheap and easy for throwaway shoes.

Insoles are so important when keeping the shape for a shoe, and the less it is damaged (blake construction) or has components attached to it (goodyear or veldtscoen construction) the better it will be. But the other golden rule is to preserve the upper, but glued, blake, brass screwed and veldtscoen break this golden rule. Norvegese doesn't break that rule because the upper is stitched to a slip sole (vital to not wear through the slip sole or else the upper will need to be HAND stitched to the slipsole), and it is also attached to an insole by hand without a component so it is possible to repair it properly.

I find shoe constructions very interesting. They tell so much of a story about a shoe.

Construction rankings
- glued
- stitchdown
- brass screwed
- blake
- veldtschoen
- goodyear
- blake rapid
- hand welted with wood pegged soles (a very good construction, but insole eventually gets damaged and hand welting will need to be done to a new insole)
- hand welted with machine stitched soles (a touch better than wood pegged imo...more resoles without need to hand welt again, but eventually welt will wear out from machine stitching and hand welting will need to be done again)
- hand welted with hand stitched soles (absolutely perfect, and that's why most bespoke makers would use this method...it preserves everything and minimises any damage)

 

[The Shooman]

My bespoke maker has already hand carved my last and made my pattern. I asked him to do a 2 eyelet derby with a toe shape like this with similar green antiquing (see green pair). He will also do as many trial shoes as needed to perfect the fit, and l will also be allowed to wear the final trial shoe for a few weeks.

 

[shookt]

I find shoe constructions very interesting. They tell so much of a story about a shoe.

Construction rankings
- glued
- stitchdown
- brass screwed
- blake
- veldtschoen
- goodyear
- blake rapid
- hand welted with wood pegged soles (a very good construction, but insole eventually gets damaged and hand welting will need to be done to a new insole)
- hand welted with machine stitched soles (a touch better than wood pegged imo...more resoles without need to hand welt again, but eventually welt will wear out from machine stitching and hand welting will need to be done again)
- hand welted with hand stitched soles (absolutely perfect, and that's why most bespoke makers would use this method...it preserves everything and minimises any damage)

Wow the fella wore right through to the cork. Crazy.

Where would norweigen, norvegese, bentivegna, and goiser fall in your list? Would these all be handwelted with hand stitched soles? Also, is there a structural difference in machine stitched vs hand stitched soles? I guess as a general rule hand stitched toes have a tighter stitch?

 

[The Shooman]

Where would norweigen, norvegese, bentivegna, and goiser fall in your list? Would these all be handwelted with hand stitched soles?

yep

Also, is there a structural difference in machine stitched vs hand stitched soles? I guess as a general rule hand stitched toes have a tighter stitch?

The idea is that the machine that stitches soles has a spring which gives it good tension, but nothing can really replace a hand and years of skill to do the perfect tension I guess.

The real thing l was getting at was that hand sewing does less damage to the welt than machine because more care is taken by hand to stitch back in the old holes.

 

[Enrile]

Sigo el trabajo de emiko Matsuda desde que trabajé en Foster.
Puedes ver su perfil en instagram @emiko.matsuda. Su trabajo indudablemente merece todo el respeto de la profesión.

 

[shookt]

Impossible Shoe Repair Project Stefano Bemer

Contest Shoes! These Stefano Bemer shoes were incredible to work on. It was a long process to try to bring them back to life. These are contest shoes and i j...

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This is the stuff of nightmares. May my shoes never reach this stage of disrepair. Interesting that the lining comes out in one entire piece. I didn't quite catch if he carved the insole himself. Basically all the rudimentary stages of shoemaking except pattern making. He should call this Norvegese rather than Norweigen yes? Really unfortunate that the owner wore through the slipsole.

 

[The Shooman]

Sigo el trabajo de emiko Matsuda desde que trabajé en Foster.
Puedes ver su perfil en instagram @emiko.matsuda. Su trabajo indudablemente merece todo el respeto de la profesión.

Hi Enrile , can you write this in english, l can't read it Italian.
Can you post some of your recent pairs of shoes while you are here.

Impossible Shoe Repair Project Stefano Bemer

Contest Shoes! These Stefano Bemer shoes were incredible to work on. It was a long process to try to bring them back to life. These are contest shoes and i j...

www.youtube.com

You beat me to posting it. I was very excited about watching this one, such a special treat, and indeed the best shoe repair video ever made. I watched every bit of it with great interest.

I didn't quite catch if he carved the insole himself.

He did carve out the insole with a slightly pronounced feather on the edge.

He should call this Norvegese rather than Norweigen yes? Really unfortunate that the owner wore through the slipsole.

Yes, he got his shoemaking terms wrong, but he sure did a good job. Always a bad idea to wear through the slipsole because the upper will need to be restitched along it.

It is Steve's version of Norvegese because it is stitched into the side of the insole and the footbed has no cork in it. Steve did a slight feather, but other Italians don't use a feather at all.

Norwegian can also be called norvegese, but it can be different if we look at this diagram below.



The problem is that the norwegian construction diagram is not necessarily accurate. It shows that the feather is hand carved, but that would be silly to place a feather in that area for an out turned upper, it lacks common sense. It's quite possible that they meant to indicate the feather as a component and make it a machine construction, but even that is silly too, but some companies want that flashy functional stitching done in a budget way so they do dumb stuff like that (I have heard some companies do things like that).

The big problem with the norwegian construction diagram is that they have fault area (the gap) between the feather component and the out turned upper, and it never makes sense to do it that way, but it needs to be done that way when a feather component is added. So yes, dumb ways used when factories want excess mass produced flash without wanting to pay the big bucks to get it done properly. A real shoemaker would never place a feather so far from the edge for norvegese; rather he would do without a feather or put a feather right on the edge of the sole/.

 

[The Shooman]

Impossible Shoe Repair Project Stefano Bemer

Contest Shoes! These Stefano Bemer shoes were incredible to work on. It was a long process to try to bring them back to life. These are contest shoes and i j...

www.youtube.com

This is the stuff of nightmares. May my shoes never reach this stage of disrepair. Interesting that the lining comes out in one entire piece. I didn't quite catch if he carved the insole himself. Basically all the rudimentary stages of shoemaking except pattern making. He should call this Norvegese rather than Norweigen yes? Really unfortunate that the owner wore through the slipsole.

Bedo's takes on one of the most adventurous shoe rebuilds ever. New insole, lining, soles and repaired cracked uppers. Completely restitched rows of stitching by hand. Such extensive repairs are unheard of.

Old shoe v's repaired shoe.



From this:


to this:



From this:


to this:

 

[Enrile]

I follow the work of emiko Matsuda since I worked at Foster.
You can see his profile on instagram @ emiko.matsuda. His work undoubtedly deserves all the respect of the profession.

 

[Great White Snark]

Don’t understand this. I’m all for extending the lifespan of things and moving away from a throw away society but
a shoe that has been abused to that degree surely just needs to be let go.
And each to his own but all that effort to restore a shoe that looks absolutely ugly as fuck anyway? And presumably give it back to the idiot who allowed it to fall into such disrepair in the first place?
Or is this entire process just an exercise in cordwaining wanking to show off the skills of what COULD be done but would never normally be bothered with?

 

[Enrile]

I am very grateful to be able to publish photos of my shoes, and I will do it, but for those who have an interest in knowing how it is done https://www.instagram.com/enrileshoes/?hl=es

 

[güero]

Or is this entire process just an exercise in cordwaining wanking to show off the skills of what COULD be done but would never normally be bothered with?

That's pretty much exactly what it is. He's doing it for a competition, which is also why he's only doing one shoe.

 

[shookt]

I am very grateful to be able to publish photos of my shoes, and I will do it, but for those who have an interest in knowing how it is done https://www.instagram.com/enrileshoes/?hl=es

Very nice shoes - they look sensible and comfortable! It looks like you use cork for filling the space between the feather?

 

[Thruth]

Don’t understand this. I’m all for extending the lifespan of things and moving away from a throw away society but
a shoe that has been abused to that degree surely just needs to be let go.
And each to his own but all that effort to restore a shoe that looks absolutely ugly as fuck anyway? And presumably give it back to the idiot who allowed it to fall into such disrepair in the first place?
Or is this entire process just an exercise in cordwaining wanking to show off the skills of what COULD be done but would never normally be bothered with?

it was for a contest. Repair one of the shoes only. Somewhere in the video he says he would not do that much work for a customer’s shoes.

 

[Thruth]

Here is the giant-headed Belgian iGent with his custom made €160 boots that he thinks have country details. If he wore those in the county someone would pitchfork his Head especially if he wore this outfit