Boots are an investment, and a lot of research goes into finding a pair of boots both versatile enough to match everything in your closet, and durable enough to hold up for years. Using our experience as bootmakers, and with the help of our friends at the famed Horween Leather Co., we offer you comprehensive guidelines to follow while shopping, to make the journey to the perfect pair of boots as painless as possible.
1
Leather
As John Culliton, who develops all of the leather at Horween Leather Co. explained, “There are three main factors that dictate a leather’s quality: richness, whether or not it came from a steer, and the amount of finishing dye used.” He recommends customers first, “look for richness.”
Does the leather look and feel vibrant? If not, it might be overdyed to cover imperfections like scratches and cracks. If you’re willing to do some background research, find out if the leather is made from cow hide, which is often stretched and will be overtreated to cover these imperfections. Conversely, if the hide came from a steer, it’s probably going to result in premium quality leather.
2
Construction
A shoe’s welting construction makes or breaks it — literally. A “cemented” shoe, where the sole is glued to the upper, lasts a matter or years. Comparatively, Goodyear welted shoes last decades. These are shoes with the iconic seams around the top perimeter of the sole, featuring stitches that run all the way through the sole to the shoe’s underside. It’s really the golden standard of footwear construction.
In addition to creating a durable, water-repellent bind between soles and their uppers, boots featuring Goodyear welts allow for resoling. If you’ve ever fallen in love with an irreplaceable pair of boots, lost them to age-related decay, and looked for a replacement to no avail, you know it can be devastating. The boots you love are yours forever with proper care, if and only if, they’re Goodyear welted.
3
Outsole
Rubber outsoles should be made of a compound that is bouncy, but durable. Some companies will include outsoles on their footwear with bounce, but they wear down like an eraser because of the rubber’s softness. Look at reviews to see how well a company’s outsoles hold up. Then, try on a pair of their boots to see how much bounce their outsole provides.
On a surface level, look for outsoles flaunting the same science behind the tread on tires: different types of grooves. They provide traction on wet surfaces, so you don’t hydroplane.
4
Comfort & Fit
Ignore toe room when trying leather boots, and rely on two other indicators of fit: heel slip and room on the sides. A very small amount of heel slip is fine, but your heel should barely slip at all. Your main focus should be on how well the shape of the boot traces the sides of your feet.
5
Price
What are you paying for? It’s easy to overpay for boots, especially if you’re new to the market, which is a sea of exorbitant mark-ups. Take the time to compare and contrast prices online. But, always put quality first. You don’t want to have to buy boots over and over again. Low quality boots will fall apart, it’s just a matter of when.
6
Brand Principles
The leather footwear market is flooded with brands who favor profits over the livelihood of their employees. To make sure you aren’t buying from brands manufacturing in sweatshops, feel free to ask companies about the working conditions in their factories. Simply looking at where a particular company manufactures is not a reliable indicator of their ethics.
7
Country of Origin
No country, as a whole, makes superior leather footwear. However, there is a noticeable difference in quality between a company that “assembles” in one place, and “manufactures”somewhere else. These companies, who might claim to make their boots in the U.S.A., when a majority of their production process happens outside of the country, are not dedicated to quality. Boots manufactured in one place will be made with fluidity that creates more thoughtfully executed products. (Manufacturing in one place is better for the environment, too!)
