Wear Your Rares! I

I have treated these boots like absolute shit. I’ve worn them everywhere, including mountain biking in bad weather. Every rainy or snowy day I wore them to work. Every mountain bike ride in November through March, they took the place of my mountain biking boots. One day they came back soaked and covered with mud. I brushed the mud/dirt off, let them dry, and then wiped them with a damp rag and brushed them for a while. In half an hour they looked fantastic.

Horween shell is arguably among the most rugged leathers in the boot world. I did brush them after pretty much every wear, and by the end they were showing some decent wear. Once the Dome ended I conditioned them with Safir Neutral Cordovan cream, and they look fantastic again. The break in was a non event and they have been comfortable under foot since day one. The natural shell portions darkened when polished, but that quickly wore off and the the natural shell appearance returned…. But that then darkened naturally. The Color 2 portions retained their beautiful color. These things have a whole lifetime ahead of them…

Dave has a great sense of how my boots should fit so these boots feel great. I rarely think about them when I’m wearing them, except to look down and admire them.

Dave from Oldspeed’s work is impeccable and these boots are among the best I have seen him make. I pretty much let him do whatever he wanted, I just gave him the color 2 shells (which were too small) and the leftover natural shell from the previous pair and told him to do whatever he wanted with them. I think he did a great job of essentially turning some scraps into a sweet pair of rare shell boots. All the wear of the dome has led to zero defects. I couldn’t be happier with these boots. The stitching is to die for. At my request Dave did not line these… so I can see the cool Horween stamps inside!

I’ve worn those suckers on sharp mountain bike pegged pedals. The same ones that destroyed the soles on my dome boots last year. These soles show ZERO wear. Don’t get Dr. Sole soles if you want to see your soles wear! Great traction, comfortable enough, and they look cool.

Good enough! I doubt they will ever need to be replaced.

Everyone should buy a pair of Oldspeed MFG boots… and if they can afford them, have him make them out of shell!