Super Versatile - Goes with anything. Worn with jeans, chinos, slacks and suits and with or without socks. A stylish GQ friend of mine wears these shoes barefoot with shorts.
Good looking - Do your current dress shoes get you compliments from strangers or do friends ask, “How long did the doctor say you have to wear those shoes?” Are you still wearing the dress shoes your mom bought you for your first big boy interview out of college?
Up Your Style - When I started wearing nice nice high quality leather shoes and boots, I naturally felt like I needed to up my clothing. So, my wife took me out to buy some new clothes and with all of the compliments, I never looked back. “The shoe maketh the man”.
People’s Perception of You - Within the first 5 to 8 seconds, whether you like it or not, people’s intuition creates a perception about you before you even speak a word. It’s a thing. Studies prove that shoes actually communicate what you value, how you value yourself and what you’re like. This study in the Journal of Research in Personality tells about how when people solely saw photographs of shoes, they made shockingly accurate guesses about the wearer’s income level, age and personality. This Psychology Today study was similar. Your appearance gets the conversation started. Your intentions and knowledge keep it going. “Shoes are the first thing people subconsciously notice. Wear nice shoes.”
Super Comfortable Anatomic Shape - “They are the most comfortable shoe I own” is the most common comment in the reviews of the Officers Boots, which share this same last as these dress shoes. Designed for all day comfort straight out of the box and for marching long distances… if you happen to get kidnapped and someone makes you. The thick leather insole AND thick slabs of leather in the middle of the shoe beneath, lets your foot impress its print and become more comfortable with each decade you wear them. Our twisted Munson last makes your feet mimic barefoot walking.
Built On Orthopedic Principles - Though these are not technically “orthopedic”, an orthopedic surgeon told me last week that if only orthopedic surgeons knew about these, they would always recommend them to their patients because patients always ask what kind of shoes to wear. A lot of our customers say their foot, knee, hip and back pain went away after wearing our shoes and boots for a few months. That’s what happened to me too.
• Wide Toe Box Benefits
○ Feet get healthy because toes aren’t constrained and can splay out with each step
○ Toes get strong by balancing more
○ Wider toe box means a more stable stance
○ Stops the ankle from rolling your weight too far before your toes push off for the next step.
• ABSOLUTELY NO Arch Support or Padding - The arch and ankles stay strong when the arch extends and contracts all day for exercise. Padding and arch support both stop the arch from moving much and so it weakens. And that puts a lot of the body out of alignment.
• Straight Inner Line - Our toe box shape is straight along the big toe so it naturally stays in line with the bones of the foot instead of being pushed inward with a fashionable toe pinching shape, which causes bunions and weakens the arch.
• Our Twisted Shape - Encourages feet to roll (pronate) and launch off at just the right time for the next step instead of overpronating or underpronating.
• Flexible Sole - So toes can move and flex to stay strong.
• Low Heel - Walking barefoot is the best option, but if you are a normal person, then you need to wear shoes. Our heel height is what Dr. Munson and his shoe board calculated as in the healthy range for musculoskeletal health and great biomechanical function. It worked perfectly for hundreds of millions of soldiers from 1912 to 1970.
High Quality For A 100 Year Warranty - High quality construction techniques, high quality materials and a high quality design make them last for the rest of your life.
• Italians have high quality construction methods that make shoes stay together, look nicer and feel better for longer.
• European cows have a very dense fiber structure which gets even tighter when the vegetable tannins pull the leather fibers together even tighter. But the extra long tanning process that Tempesti uses to tan it is what makes ours one of the toughest, yet finest, leathers in the world so the shoe holds its shape beautifully.
• Our high quality design snugly holds the heel and waist of your foot in one place so your foot doesn’t bang around and beat up and stretch out the toe box from the inside.
• Our leather lining is of the highest quality too.
• Not hot and sweaty, because leather breathes and regulates temperature
• Stinky bacteria grows on synthetics, but our shoes smell like leather for decades. You can even rewear the same socks several times, but don’t volunteer that information to strangers or to your wife.
• No synthetics to leach off warm and moist chemicals that the feet absorb into your blood system
The Most Popular Last in History - This rarest of shoe shapes is the most consequential and famous anatomically correct form in history. Dr. Edward Lyman Munson, a relative of mine, developed this twisted shoe last in 1912 for hundreds of millions of soldiers in the US Military from 1912 to about 1970. There were 6 generations of the Munson last. Ours is based on the 1st generation which no longer exists anywhere on Earth that we know of besides the one we found in a small collectors market in Paris. When the 2nd generation went into production in about 1919, all of the prior wooden lasts were burned for firewood. Over the years, they all disappeared.
Up Your Confidence - The theory of Enclothed Cognition says that wearing certain types of shoes can affect our confidence levels, behavior and even thinking abilities and it starts from the ground up.
When someone puts on a pair of quality leather shoes, they feel more powerful and you’ll often see their demeanor change instantly. They stand taller, move with intention and ooze with self confidence. That transformation happened to me and it’s one of the most compelling reasons why high quality shoes matter so much. “Shoes transform your body language and attitude. They lift you physically and emotionally.”
In the U.S., shoes with a layer of leather on the toe are called Cap Toe shoes, but in Europe they’re called Toe Cap shoes. Toe Cap flows off the tongue way easier than Cap Toe, so we’re going with Toe Cap. And technically, the style of shoe is called a Derby, which is far more attractive than an Oxford style shoe, but I think the name Derby sounds kind of dumb, so I’m just calling it the Toe Cap shoe. Watch out for false toe caps on cheaper shoes. It is not a second layer, but just constructed to look like it.
Quality leather shoes function like quiet social signals. They don't determine personality, but they often reflect preferences, values and the image someone wants to project. The right pair of quality dress shoes can command respect in a boardroom or exhibit taste at a cafe. They are ambassadors who speak on our behalf and represent what we stand for. High quality shoes tell the world about what you value; your appreciation for craftsmanship and willingness to invest in yourself, your personality, etiquette, degree of professionalism, understanding of quality, socioeconomic status and even emotional state.
Those who are traditional, detail oriented, more formal, practical and confident and who prefer timeless, tried and true designs, wear Toe Caps. They choose careers and relationships where trust, competence and conservative actions are valued, like in law, finance, executive leadership and formal business. The impression they often leave is: "I'm here to be taken seriously." The color of the shoe fits the personality or the occasion, Browns speak of down to Earthness. Lighter colors signal more approachable and warm, while black is more serious and business oriented.
Our Eternal Good Sole - A shoe is normally resoleable two or three times, but if you choose to resole it on the last resole with our patent pending rubber Good Sole, you can resole it over and over again for the rest of your life without destroying the welt or body. “It's better to buy one good pair of shoes than four cheap ones.”
1. “Good shoes take you good places.”
2. “You are either in your bed or in your shoes, so it pays to invest in both.”
3. “Quality shoes don’t just support your feet — they support your presence.”
4. “The difference between walking in and owning the room might just be your shoes.”
5. “The right shoes speak louder than words.”
6. “Shoes are a silent introduction. They speak before you do.”
7. “A man’s shoes are the first thing a woman notices.”
8. “What you put on your feet tells the world where you've been and where you think you're going.”
9. “Clothes make the man. Naked people have little or no influence on society.” - Mark Twain
10. My favorite “Never touch another man’s shoes” - Julian Imrie
