Today's Shoes

Gravati austerity brogues in larice (chestut brown) Lama (14953, last 640). No, the shoes to the left are not the shoes I'm wearing today, although I do own a pair of them, too. I included the picture to illustrate what an austerity brogue is: a wing-tip bal, only without any of the broguing (punching) that one typically sees on such a shoe. The story is that austerity brogues originated in Great Britain during World War I as a war-time measure to save leather: on a wing-tip with broguing, there has to be a piece of leather underneath the entirety of the wing cap so that the holes and backed by a finished piece of leather and don't look silly. Not so an austerity brogue: the piece of leather comprising the vamp can end just past where it is stitched to the wing cap. How much leather this would have saved, I don't know. I can't imagine that it would have been very much, especially since no self-respecting Briton would have worn a wing-tip in town anyway. The shoes that I'm wearing today comprise my other pair of Goodyear-welted Gravatis. These were a special order, and the only thing that I regret is having them made on the 640 last. Something narrower like the 500 would have been better. Alas.