Good leather boots and shoes should last a lifetime but many of us throw away our shoes at the first sign of wear and tear.
Out of the 24 billion items of footwear that are produced in the world every year, 90% end up in landfills and your pair of discarded trainers can remain there for up to 1,000 years due to the materials they are made from.
A way to reduce your impact on the environment is to revive your footwear rather than buy new every time. A wave of eco businesses has appeared recently who will upcycle your old trainers and give them a new life – all done with environmentally friendly materials and very often working with local businesses such as cobblers.
You may think that your old trainers are beyond help but in the hands of a craftsman, they can be revived and restored – often with embellishments which can make them even more attractive than they were when you first bought them. A clean-up with warm soapy water and a wet rag, a new sole – yes you can re-sole your trainers – and a moisturising cream can bring them back to life and transform them.
Maintain the shape by inserting a wooden shoe tree – but who puts them in their trainers? Inserting a shoe tree when you take your shoes off, when they are warm, will absorb moisture and help restore their shape which will keep them looking good for longer. Hand clean trainers with warm soapy water – do not put them in the washing machine – and nourish them with shoe cream.
When you first saw your trainers or shoes in the shop you fell in love with them and had to have them but now, left neglected, they become old and worn and you discard them. Why wouldn’t you care for a pair of trainers or shoes that you love and that are comfortable? Treat them as good friends and they will reward you by supporting your feet for years.
By not discarding them you are doing more than saving money. You are reducing the amount of plastic and carbon used in the manufacture and reducing the 90% which end up in landfills, all of which reduces your carbon footprint and is good for our planet.
Revamping your trainers is a way of having the pleasure of something new, made from saving what you have. The ‘vamp’ is the front part of a shoe, where your toes sit and the term ‘revamp’ comes from the bootmaking industry process of replacing this part of the shoe.
Your shoes do not need to be bespoke and made to measure to be ‘revamped’, there are many companies offering a service to revamp, re-sole and rejuvenate ‘off the shelf’ shoes in a way that you wouldn’t have imagined a few years ago. Companies like Grenson and Churchill in the UK have been doing this for years and cobblers like Cobbler Express Shoe Repair in New York will even repair and restore your Louboutin. Some shoe restorers will remove the sole from the shoe completely and replace it with a new one. When doing this they feed the leather upper to restore the appearance. When you get them back they have the signs of being worn but in a wonderful characterful way which gives them a particularly attractive aesthetic.
I was inspired to write this piece when watching the ‘Leather Boots’ episode of the BBC series Inside the Factory. I love this show because I’m fascinated by manufacturing and especially craftsmanship. It featured one of the new businesses that are working to restore worn trainers in their Customise Studio at Koko Art. They paint on designs using long-lasting acrylic paint for leather and have a wide range of inspired designs and looks.
The process in the Dr Marten factory shows craftsmanship and precision making of the boots – all of the processes require the operator to stand up, apart from a process called skiving off, which runs the edge of the leather over a knife to thin the edges that are later stitched together. The operator has to sit down for this process when everyone else has to stand so the term ‘skiving off’ became used for not working hard. I love that.
All the employees featured in the show are wearing Dr Martens – from thick soles to pink patent – it shows their commitment to and belief in the product. They genuinely seem content in their work and have pride in their product. If you are interested in shoes this is a must-see.
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