LONGWING

The Shoe

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 13:23:30 +0000

Every now and then I check in with the JM Weston website in the vain hope that it no longer exists. Even though I consider myself a fan of those venerable French shoemakers (hence the visits) trying to navigate your way through that cumbersome site is like swimming in treacle.

It clearly must have cost a lot of money but every image and page takes an age to load and it goes to show that however much money you throw at something it won’t always result in a good user experience.

It’s ironic if you look at the web presence of most mens ‘traditional’ shoemakers, many have spent very little without any negative impact to their brand, then somebody like Weston can spend a significant amount demonstrating their desire to embrace the web as a form of communication but by getting the execution wrong it results in a poor user experience.

Personally i’d like to see brands make more use of their web presence, it’s just important for them to connect in the right way that will not only protect the heritage of their brand but also enhance their reputation by having a better connection with their market.

Back to JM Weston, as I want to finish on a much more positive note. Over the last couple of months I have parked a few ideas for posts but unfortunately not got around to posting (I’ve been busy, apologies - normal service to resume in the new year). One of those posts also relates to Weston so only fair that I include it now;

In September, French man-about-town André Saraiva (graffiti artist, filmmaker, hotel and nightclub impresario) collaborated with JM Weston to make a short film entitled ‘The Shoe’ to celebrate the Weston loafer. So I was pleasantly surprised when I made my routine check in with the site to find a great trailer for this film pop right up on my screen (unfortunately, same old site lurking behind!). You can watch the trailer by visiting the JM Weston homepage and clicking on your preferred language version, it should pop up straight after. You can also buy the full length film from Colette.fr it’s 20 odd minutes long and comes in a box with some extras including a soundtrack CD.

I liked the trailer enough to purchase the film and I’m glad I did. It’s worth it for the soundtrack alone! Congrats to Saraiva and Weston for a nice piece of marketing, now please sort that website out!

Happy holidays, Christmas and New Year, see you on the other side…

Quoddy Workshop Video

Thu, 18 Aug 2011 10:22:00 +0100

Quoddy Workshop - Lewiston, Maine from Oliver Wilkins on Vimeo.

I always love seeing inside the factories, you can feel the pride and passion that the people have for their product. This is a great one featuring Quoddy of Maine, it’s shot by Oliver Wilkins and via The Shoe Buff.

Carmina

Thu, 04 Aug 2011 16:23:00 +0100

Carmina is a Spanish shoemaker founded by José Albaladejo in 1997 and based in Mallorca. Albaladejo has a rich family history in shoemaking and Carmina uses the same techniques, quality and attention to detail as it’s more recognised British counterparts.

Carmina has a deserved growing reputation and recently revamped and relaunched it’s website and announced the imminent arrival of a webshop. The ability to purchase online should be well recieved as until now you would struggle to purchase Carmina outside of Spain and Paris (where they have boutiques).

At the time of writing Carmina is in it’s summer shutdown period for a couple of weeks but I hope to bring you news of the launch date for the webshop soon as well as another post with more detailed information about the characteristics of each last.

In the meantime, enjoy the images and have a look at the site, and also take a look at some of the great examples the guys at The Armoury in Hong Kong have had made.

Alcudia Last

Deia Last

Forest Last

Queens Last

Simpson Last

Soller Last

Church's at Pitti Uomo 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 23:22:04 +0100

Alden at Pitti Uomo 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 23:21:57 +0100

H? Katsukawa from Tokyo at Pitti 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 23:21:52 +0100

http://hkatsukawafromtokyo.net/

Edward Green at Pitti Uomo 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 23:21:45 +0100

Brunello Cucinelli at Pitti Uomo 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 23:21:39 +0100

Diemme at Pitti Uomo 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 23:21:31 +0100

Walk-Over at Pitti Uomo 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 23:21:21 +0100

Car-Shoe at Pitti Uomo 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 23:21:14 +0100

Sebago at Pitti Uomo 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 23:21:06 +0100

Calzature at Pitti Uomo 80

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 16:00:05 +0100

Photo: Tommy Ton

The next series of posts will be images from the recent Pitti Uomo 80 in Florence, apologies for the lateness as the show has been and gone but as we all know, great footwear is timeless!

BOOT BLACK, Shoe Care Video

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 12:16:42 +0100

Columbus is the Japanese company behind the premium shoe care brand ‘Boot Black’ featured previously on Longwing. They have just produced an informative and detailed video guide to shoe care complete with English subtitles. It covers the basics as well as some more advanced techniques and is well worth a look if you have a spare 12 minutes.

Koronya - Ready To Wear

Tue, 17 May 2011 08:00:06 +0100

Koronya is a small family run business based in Budapest, Hungary. The first written proof that it existed dates back to 1876 but present owner and master shoemaker Marcell Mrsan had to restart the business from scratch after 40 years of socialism before the Hungarian revolution ravaged all small family businesses. All Marcell had to work with was his knowledge gained from graduating as a shoemaker in 1989 and the memories of his 95 year old grandmother.

Marcell is doing his best to preserve the future of shoemaking through the increasingly popular Koronya shoemaking courses that vary from short intensive courses to full 6 month apprenticeships.

Koronya have recently relaunched their website www.koronya.com, and even though they are best known and revered for their bespoke shoes they have now launched a mens ready to wear line. The collection consists of a cap toe Oxford, a wholecut and a plain Derby all built on Last no. 224 and available in six different colours. See images below.

Marcell was kind enough to give me some of his time recently to answer a couple of questions;

Q: What is your shoemaking philosophy?

MM: Well, these days we have to cope with mass production, and misuse of the term “hand-made” to describe factory made products. I believe we shoemakers have to show with our work that this concept means something else, something better and much higher quality. Do not misunderstand me - I don’t have a problem with machines - they are needed, as we couldn’t produce enough footwear with hand work alone. On the other hand I really believe that we have to preserve the same quality and techniques that we inherited. I want to produce shoes which aren’t worse than the old ones, and made exactly the same way - if someone needs that quality and fastidiousness - you might want to buy Koronya shoes.

Q: Does the RTW collection currently just consist of the three styles featured on your website?

MM: Yes, we are a small workshop and a short menu means a good restaurant! we will be adding to the collection in due time.

Q: Which other shoemakers do you admire?

MM: There are many but let me mention my Swedish friend Janne Melkersson, a great person and highly skilled and knowledgable shoemaker.

Q: What shoe advice would you give to a man?

MM: A few things;

1. Every gentleman should have at least one pair of bespoke shoes - so if you can afford it, get a pair. Consider this; a badly made bag or suit won’t affect your health, badly fitting footwear can cause serious problems.

2. Learn a bit about shoes.

3. Don’t but any crap, which claims to be “made by hand”. We, hand working shoemakers wouldn’t write those things on our shoes.

Ready To Wear:

Bespoke:

For more information on Marcell, Koronya and the shoemaking courses, visit their recently redesigned website www.koronya.com

Boot Black, Japan

Tue, 22 Mar 2011 16:43:25 +0000

I discovered Boot Black for the first time in January at Pitti and posted about them at the time. Boot Black is the flagship, luxury care brand of The Columbus Co. which is a Japanese specialist in shoe care products across the market, in a similar vein to Medaille D’Or from Saphir. Although I saw the impressive product range on demo in Florence I was yet to trial the products myself. I’m not too fussy about my shoe care products, I do have good supplies of Saphir but find that the best product usually depends on the job in hand. Some of the more mass marketed wax polishes contain more pigment which is particularly handy when giving a pair of black oxfords an overhaul for example. Much of shoe care ritual is down to personal preference and tradition and I certainly advocate that. Anyway, having discovered this new brand I was keen to give it a try.

It was ironic that I should receive a package from Tokyo on the very day news of the Earthquake and subsequent Tsunami broke. The trivialities of shoe care pale into insignificance in light of what happened on that day and since. I spent the next few days trying to find out if everybody at Columbus Co was ok as if it was my mission so I was delighted to eventually receive an email from Masamichi, letting me know that everyone was safe and relatively unaffected.

Having now used the creams I am very impressed, the colours are perfect and the cream is very easy to work with and rich in pigment, a little goes a long way which is exactly what you want. I’d rate the cream similar to those from Saphir which is high praise. Another thing Boot Black has impressed me with is how extensive their range is, they make every product you can imagine and HERE is a PDF detailing the range in full.

As far as I know Boot Black is not currently available outside of Japan but expect to see it arriving at quality establishments in the very near future.

Factory: Edward Green II

Mon, 07 Mar 2011 11:21:54 +0000

Euan Denholm from Edward Green was kind enough to give me access to his incredible factory images. After giving some thought to doing them justice I eventually came up with this.

Click through to vimeo to enjoy the photographs in a larger version of the film.

Progress

Sat, 05 Mar 2011 16:05:25 +0000

Longwing is just one month old today and the feedback and enthusiasm for the blog has been incredible. I’d like to thank everyone for taking time to visit, traffic is already way beyond where I expected it to be at this early stage. Were still evolving and finding our way but I hope to develop things and bring you lots of interesting and varied content as we progress. We also have some very exciting things planned so please stay tuned and I’ll keep you posted with all developments right here.

Factory: Edward Green

Thu, 03 Mar 2011 13:52:21 +0000

Recently I had the pleasure of spending a day at the Edward Green factory in Northampton. For a shoe aficionado this is akin to being a child and finding yourself inside Willy Wonka’s chocolate factory for the day. My golden ticket gave me unlimited access to the artisans and craftsmen that make some of the finest shoes you’ll find anywhere in the world. Talking to the workforce gives you the best insight into a company you can ask for and what really fascinated me was the pride and passion that the workers have for their craft and for their company.

Starting in the clicking room where patterns for each style of shoe are meticulously cut out from the most exceptional skins, it quickly becomes apparent that one of the things that sets a shoemaker like Edward Green apart from others is the quality of the materials they use. I was shown areas of one skin that were not going to be suitable for using and it’s only when you examine it very closely can you spot any imperfection at all, and that’s with the benefit of an expert pointing it out! Into the next room where I meet the lady that hand writes every label that ends up inside a finished pair of Edward Green’s and one of the day’s early highlights was getting to watch the guys that hand stitch the aprons using the famous pig bristle technique.

Walking through the gap in a wall of lasts leads you into the the engine room of the factory, the home of the heavy machinery, here another highlight is watching the welting and another highly skilled but seemingly effortless process of skiving the outer edge of the sole. This means that once the sole is sewn to the upper, the stitches can be covered for a seamless, perfect artisan finish.

The last step was watching the finished shoes receive their final polishing and it was incredible to see how different a shoe can look from it’s ‘finished’ manufactured state to how it looks when it’s ready to be boxed.

I would like to thank the good people of Edward Green for my memorable experience, everybody I met is a credit to the company and it was a privilege to witness first hand the skill and passion that turns a pair of shoes into a pair of Edward Green’s.

Carreducker at Gieves & Hawkes

Wed, 23 Feb 2011 15:57:45 +0000

A visit to Savile Row last week yielded a chance meeting with the venerable James Ducker, one half of bespoke shoemakers Carreducker.

Carreducker have recently taken up a residence in Gieves & Hawkes at 1 Savile Row as part of an extensive refurbishment. Gieves rightly see a bespoke shoe offering as an integral part of the gentleman’s emporium, especially one with such a prestigious address!

James’ journey into shoemaking began when he happened upon some evening classes whilst living in Barcelona. When he returned to the UK, he and Deborah Carré met whilst both apprenticed at John Lobb and eventually Carreducker was born.

As well as a deserved reputation for incredible bespoke shoemaking, Carreducker are also noted for their bespoke shoemaking courses. James was a tutor at Cordwainers (part of the London College of Fashion college) and when they dropped the course, Carreducker stepped in and took over, and in so doing preserved this unique crafts educational status in London.

The courses have now been running for 4 years and attract an eclectic group of students. Classes are restricted to 7 students to provide plenty of access to the tutor and at the end of the 12 day intensive course, students walk away in a pair of bespoke shoes made with their own hands!

It was a pleasure to spend some time with James, watch him work and learn more about Carreducker, and he being a master craftsman I was interested to know which other shoemakers he admired, which included; Koronya, Gaziano & Girling and John Lobb on the bespoke side and Pierre Corthay and Edward Green amongst his ready to wear favourites.

If you’re in London, pop in and see Carreducker at Gieves & Hawkes otherwise learn more about them and the fantastic courses at www.carreducker.com