Guide to our shoes, their fit, wearability and longevity
Find here information on how to care for our shoes, the sustainable natural leather, suitable storage and how to maintain their appearance and function
So that you can enjoy our products for a long time, you will find the following care instructions and some advice on our natural leather shoes and their preservation:
Regular care is required to maintain the suppleness and resilience of our high-quality natural leather. Shoes should always be cared for before use, so that you protect your shoes from environmental influences with the greasing and they adapt better to the feet.
Special features of natural leather tanning:
The natural leather we use to manufacture our natural leather shoes are exclusively from European origin that were bred for meat production. The cattle hides are selected by us according to strict criteria and tanned in a gentle, chrome-free manner exclusively in Germany, Italy, Spain and Portugal, so that the structure of the leather fibers is encased and not broken. This special tanning style preserves the natural properties of the leather skin, such as the temperature-regulating function, which does not allow the foot to heat up too much in summer as well as keeping the feet warm in winter. The sohpisticated tanning method also preserves the elasticity of the leather fibers, so that the dimensional stability of our natural leather shoes can be maintained very well, if shoe trees are used additionally.
In order not to close the leather pores, our natural leathers are not treated with the finishing coat that is unfortunately common today. Likewise, we do not fix the color on the leather surface with chemical products, which means that the water vapor permeability and thus the wearing comfort is significantly better. As a result, scars, wrinkling and irregularities are clearly visible on our natural leathers. This does not represent a defect, but on the contrary is a sign of naturalness. The particularly gentle tanning process could, under certain circumstances, result in the leather bleeding; please take this into consideration when choosing your stockings and choose dark-colored goods if necessary.
In order to maintain suppleness, a water-repellent effect, temperature-regulating breathability, elasticity and thus shape stability, our natural leather shoes should be cared for regularly.
Notes on dimensional stability:
In order to maintain the dimensional stability of our natural leather shoes, they must be allowed to dry with air circulation for at least 24 hours after each wear. For this purpose they are best rested on wooden stretchers, ideally made of cedar wood, or they should at least be stuffed inside with paper; both absorb the moisture from the leather and stretch it to its original shape. Under no circumstances should they be placed near a heater or similar. To dry, please remove the soft bedding from the shoes.
Instructions for cleaning, treating damaged areas, grease, polishing:
Our natural leathers are neither finished nor tanned with a plasticized covering layer, nor with chrome, heavy metals and harmful chemicals. We therefore also recommend good natural products for care, such as those from the Tapir company (www.tapir.de) available for different types of leather. These consist mainly of natural grease and oils, which help to preserve the functionality of natural leather and its beautiful appearance; they are economical and environmentally friendly.
Product recommendations for the care of the different types of leather:
For all smooth leather that should shine slightly after polishing, we recommend using Tapir's leather balm. You should apply this as thinly as possible to the leather using a soft cloth. The application should dry briefly afterwards and then polish out the balm with a soft brush until the desired level of shine is achieved. For the perfect finish, wipe the treated leather again with a soft cloth so residues of the care balm are completely absorbed by the leather grain and no longer remain on the surface of the leather skin.
The surface of the nobuck leather have to be treated completely differently to keep and maintain the matt character of the fine hair. To do so, you should apply the leather oil from Tapir with a cloth as thinly, evenly and extensively as possible. The oil then needs some time to fully soak into the leather. The best place to dry your shoes is in a place with plenty of air circulation, but never near a heat source. Then you should rub the nobuck leather carefully and flat with the help of a natural crépe cloth, which will give it its original matt appearance again.
All care products should always be applied before wearing, so that the shoes are protected against environmental influences in the best way. Incidentally, you should grease soles that have a leather frame as well as the seams together with the leather upper and then polish them.
Brushes with natural bristles are more suitable for our natural leather shoes than harder Perlon brushes. Bristles that are too hard could damage the leather. If it is necessary to remove dirt with water, the application should be very careful and the leather should only be rubbed briefly with a damp cloth. Under no circumstances should the leather be wet and/or rubbed with pressure on the surface with moisture; either could damage the leather grain. Then wipe with a dry cloth and let the shoes rest until the leather leg is completely dry again. Here, too, you should definitely make sure that the shoes are far away from heat sources and have sufficient air circulation.
If there might be heavier dirt on the shoes, you could work gently and thinly with a special leather soap and a damp cloth; again, the leather must not really get wet and/or treated with pressure. The soap scum should be picked up carefully according to the manufacturer's instructions; the shoe must then be completely dry again before further processing.
In winter times salt stains might occur on the leahter after walking in the cities. The road salt attacks the leather grain very aggressively within a short period of time. Here, particularly careful drying is even more important than it already is. Proper greasing of the leather helps to a limited extent as a preventive measure. Unfortunately, the salt is always too destructive, so that greasing only offers a temporary minimum protection. However, should salt stains occur, allow your shoes to dry thoroughly and evenly for a particularly long time with high air circulation and far away from heat sources. Then carefully wipe off the white salt on the surface with a cloth or kitchen paper. Then put a little milk on a cloth and carefully treat the edges of the leather that have been attacked by the salt. Again, the shoes have to dry again before you can grease them before the next use.
If the leather is damaged, you can smooth it out, like a scratch, with a rounded wooden or plastic object, formerly a bone intended for this purpose, with appropriate counter-pressure from the inside along the damaged leather grain. You should not exert too much pressure, otherwise the leather grain would be flattened, the gloss level would differ from the surrounding leather and the grain would be closed. However, scratches in the leather or external damage cannot be completely undone.
Additional comments on this topic can also be found under the menu item FAQs and tapir.de for the proper care products.
Notes on care, greasing, polishing and the recommended products for our natural leather shoes:
As soon as the shoes to be cared for are clean and dry, you can start caring for the leather. You can use both brushes and rags for this. In both cases, these should not be too hard so as not to put additional stress on the natural leather. All care products should be used sparingly, applied evenly and thinly.
Grease and waxes can be applied to the leather with a cloth or a small, soft brush; only the rag is suitable for the leather oil.
To polish, use a medium-soft large brush in the first step and then a particularly soft one in the second. For the final shine, wipe the shoes again with a soft cloth.
Further information on the suitability of brushes according to application, color, etc. can be found in the menu item FAQs.
You can clean suede leather with a special brush with harder plastic bristles or with a fine metal wire brush and at the same time roughen the leather pile again. The particularly fine pile of genuine goat suede is better cleaned with a small natural crépe brush, which is also used for nobuck leather. For cleaning and roughening the nobuck leather, we recommend a special crépe cloth made of natural rubber, which is used over a large area and does not attack the fine grinding less on a smaller area.
When selecting the brushes and cloths, please note that you should not use the same tools for dark and light leather colors in order to avoid possible staining of the remaining color pigments.
To use waterproofing sprays for shoes:
The vast majority of impregnation sprays are made with a large proportion of propellants, carriers and odorants, as well as additional products, such as chemical auxiliaries. The advertised water-repellent function is said to be achieved with the use of silicone. The use of a spray suggests to the buyer a simple shoe care that takes little time and without the risk of soiling your hands. Commercial sprays are neither particularly productive, sustainable or environmentally friendly, nor do they have a good effect. Silicone can close the leather pores; this significantly reduces the water vapor permeability of the natural leather and thus worsens the wearing comfort. Furthermore, a protective effect, if it should be present, is very limited in time. This is already due to the way it is applied; a relatively small percentage of the substances contained in the impregnation sprays end up on the upper leather of the shoes. A very large proportion is distributed in the air and does not hit the shoe when sprayed on, but simply passes by. The part that reaches the leather does not penetrate. This also means that the theoretical protective effect is not great. Unfortunately, there is no real alternative to applying and mechanically rubbing in a good care product. In addition, the atomization of a waterproofing spray is often not fine enough, which means that dripping stains can form and remain on the leather. In the case of smooth leather, you could quickly wipe them off, which would then bring you back to the process that you want to avoid with the spray and you could immediately choose the better care of rubbing in. With the suede types, especially the fine nobuck and kid suede leather, it can even happen that the drops can no longer be removed.
The chemical substances contained in most impregnation sprays are contrary to the environmentally friendly tanning of our natural leather, which we wanted to avoid during production.
Proper storage - temperature, humidity and light:
Good shoes should be kept in a place with adequate air circulation, at moderate temperatures, with low humidity and without direct light. Since no covering finishing layer was applied to our natural leathers, they are open-pored and somewhat more sensitive to light; therefore, they should not be left in direct sunlight for long periods of time.
We kindly ask for your understanding if we cannot accept complaints that are due to non-observance of our care instructions and/or wear and tear.
If you have any questions about your size, please feel free to contact us at any time