I went and saw my shoemaker John during lunch today to give him some gifts as an excuse to catch up. Haven’t seen him for a while and l have been wondering how he has been. We had a good old chat in the garden. I showed him my John Lobb, Anthony Cleverley and Vass black oxford captoes with their shoo trees, but he had trouble believing the Vass were handmade, so l told him to look at the sole stitching in the light and to feel the inseaming stitches pulling against the feather. He couldn’t see the hand stitches, nor could he feel the dimpled insole under the sock, so the next thing l knew he takes my Vass shoo to the shed and starts ripping it apart. I thought, holy F***ing sh*t, and my eyes almost fell out and l almost passed out in shock at what he was doing. I thought that my Vass was gonna be stuffed by the time he had finished with it, but l remained silent and continued to watch him take tools to my shoo and rip it apart. I thought, if he buggers it he can fix it lol. He was ripping up the sock to check if the insole was dimpled (hand welted).

The next thing l did was talk about shoo polishes. Australia has some of the crummiest polish going, and the colours are so limited. John can’t get tan or burgundy locally, but l will get him a bunch of top quality stuff to top him up.

Another thing he was saying was how the bloke in Brunswick can’t make his shoos entirely local anymore because some old bloke has stopped making shoe soles because his hands are buggered, so now he has to import from ltaly.  John still does the hand stitching of the uppers for this bloke, but he is getting older too and won’t be around for ever.  The industry is almost gone in Victoria now, the old blokes have retired.  Btw, John used to have a shoo shop in Melbourne in the 60’s in Flinders Lane, then shut up, then he opened up years later opposite his old shop in Flinders Lane. He had the shop until 1991 (never knew that before).

The leather is crap in Australia
John was saying what we both know, the leather quality used to make shoos is second or third rate in Oz, it is complete crap and no-one in the trade locally uses anything of much quality at all. The only person in the state that seems to be using decent leather is John, and that is because he has old stock from years ago. He was telling me that Brian Lester came to his house not long ago looking for leather, but John wants to hold onto his old stock because no-one can get it here anymore.  I am gonna visit Brian Lester soon, and if he wants a few lessons l will ask John to teach him. Brian is keen, but he is 65 as well.

I was saying to John that the industry may be revived due to Bruce Millar and various makers getting together and sharing equipment , but John was having none of it. He said we can’t get decent leather, the polish is limited and rubbish and we have nothing here anymore. He reckons the industry is finished.

John is coming to Cleverley trunk show

I have talked John into coming to the trunk show near Easter, it will be great to see what he thinks of their work and for him to see the shop. Unfortunately he will see the prices of the Johnny Lobb’s and Cleverley bespokes,  and it WILL shock him lol. I hope to film the occasion where l get my first BIG boy shoo and film an old shoe making legend. 

It’s good catching up and talking to people in the trade.