Wesco Mister Lou

I'd been wanting to add a slip-on or two to my my collection and had had a slow-moldering ember of interest in the engineer style for the last several months. A lot of people on the internet consider the Mister Lou one of the platonic ideals of this style, and it's common to see paeons of praise paired together with lamentations of Wesco's long lead times. So, when I saw Iron Heart had my size and a leather I wanted to try in stock, I figured that I might as well jump on it because that might not happen again soon.

I read all the information I could online before buying. I wear size 9 D width in most leather footwear, including the Red Wing 8 last, Alden TruBalance last, Alden Van last, and others. I'm a size 43 in most leather footwear that uses European/Asian sizing. What I saw online is that there are quite a few conflicting recommendations for going everything from true to size to a full size down from Brannock, but most recommendations seemed consistent in that they recommended taking your "normal" size and potentially sizing up a width if you have a high volume foot. I have an unusually high instep which is often the deciding factor for me with sizing, so I did exactly that. When I slipped my foot into the boot it landed with a satisfying thunk and felt like it had fallen perfectly into place, so I knew immediately that I'd gotten the sizing just right. I wear them with the stock leather insert and they fit just right with athletic socks. Thick wool socks can fit but feel very compressed and can get painful over time with the insert still in. Interestingly, it's not a struggle for me to get these on or off. That's very different from other tall slip-ons, which are usually very difficult for me. My feet slide right through the pass through and I usually don't even need to use a boot horn. Some people online would say that this lack of struggle means the boots are too large. But the fit feels good and there's minimal heel slip so the proof is in the pudding.

I ordered the boots online and Iron Heart's customer service shot me an email asking me to confirm that I'd got the sizing right before they shipped it. I did that, they shipped it from overseas, and a week later I had them in hand.