Edward Green Appreciation: Pictures, Info, and Where to Buy

[JFWR]

Do you say that e.g. this shoe Aldershot black scotch grain is not GYW, i.e. welt is not stitched to insole and midsole, but everything is glued together and the visible stitching is just for effect and that Crockett & Jones confirmed that to you? And that it is still reparable?

According to Crockett and Jones email the vibram cleated shoes are gyw.

 

[JFWR]

@Jmr928, you may be missing what some are alleging, and I believe two people are saying they've observed first hand (one from C&J and one from EG), namely that the welt itself is fake, just glued on, so that there is no stitching at all involving the soles.

Here's a pic of a fake welt. You'll notice that it comes with the stitching already applied, and it's just glued to the top of a sole or midsole that is either glued or Blake stitched to an upper:
View attachment 1816638
@DWFII would not be surprised at all, as he has long said the GYW itself is a cost-cutting, profit-raising shortcut that leads to a slippery slope of plastic toe and heel stiffeners, etc.

That said, I do agree with you that even if the welts are fake and glued on, that doesn't make the shoes garbage. There are many things that make a shoe good, and only someone who bought the false marketing about GYW would think that if a shoe doesn't have it, it's garbage. I'd hope that even if EG is using fake welts, the uppers are still made of quality leather, but if they really are using fake welts, it would/should make one suspicious.

Btw, some EG loafers, like the Purbeck, and, I think, Portland, Padstow, Polpero, and Albert are cemented. Of course, they also cost about half as much as EG's welted shoes.

I think the problem would be that the leather quality difference is not so great that eg could reasonably charge the amount they do for shoes if they're cemented.

The leather is nice on eg but is it vastly better? Not really.

There is an expectation that quality should be assumed with high prices.

 

[emptym]

You may be underestimating the difference in leather quality between EG and Rockports. Rockport uses a corrected grain, at best. And, as I mentioned, there are many things that go into the making of a good shoe. In addition to upper quality, there's the pattern (Cheaper shoes often have extraneous seams on their uppers to same money.), the last designs, the time the uppers spend on the lasts (allowing the shoe to take on its curves and not look blobby), the lining's quality (full grain calfskin vs cloth, vinyl, pigskin, corrected grain, etc.), the stiffeners (hopefully leather vs fiberboard or plastic), the price of the labor involved, etc. And I would imagine that Dainite or Ridgeway is a more durable rubber than that used by Rockport, etc.

So to call EG's garbage based simply on one thing (cemented vs GYW shoes), is foolish. If you were speaking in hyperbole, fine. I just don't think we should overvalue GYW (which itself relies heavily on glue as the gemming glued to the insole) and we should appreciate clearly that there are many other things that distinguish shoes by EG from shoes by Rockport.

I don't think it's wise to expect higher quality based simply on price. As you know well, there are many designer brands with higher prices and lower quality than EG, but then one what one is really paying for is the brand name built by expensive ads, real estate, and celebrity endorsements.

 

[Mr_Spud]

Fun convos all round. What I find fascinating is that this kicked off without any real world evidence….just yet anyway.

 

[JohnMRobie]

@Jmr928, you may have missed what some are alleging and I believe two people have said they've observed first hand (one from C&J and one from EG), namely that the welt itself is fake, just glued on, so that there is no stitching at all involving the soles.

Here's a pic of a fake welt. You'll notice that it comes with the stitching already applied, and it's just glued to the top of a sole or midsole that is either glued or Blake stitched to an upper:
View attachment 1816638
@DWFII would not be surprised at all, as he has long said the GYW itself is a cost-cutting, profit-raising shortcut that leads to a slippery slope of plastic toe and heel stiffeners, etc.

That said, I do agree with you that even if the welts are fake and glued on, that doesn't make the shoes garbage. There are many things that make a shoe good, and only someone who bought the false marketing about GYW would think that if a shoe doesn't have it, it's garbage. I'd hope that even if EG is using fake welts, the uppers are still made of quality leather, but if they really are using fake welts, it would/should make one suspicious.

Btw, some EG loafers, like the Purbeck, and, I think, Portland, Padstow, Polpero, and Albert are cemented. Of course, they also cost about half as much as EG's welted shoes.

No, I saw exactly what they alleged. My point was that however well intentioned @shoefan57 may be, I believe him to be mistaken.

It’s absolutely bonkers to allege that Edward Green would be rolling out a fully cemented shoe with a faux welt priced and represented dishonestly as GWY based on the claim (presented with zero evidence) that Crockett Jones does it so EG must be doing as well.

 

[reidd]

GYW has nothing to do with how the outsole is attached to the welt. A normal way to attach the sole is to use a machine to stitch(rapid) through the welt and sole, but one may also very well cement the rubber sole to the midsole.
This is exactly what Saint Crispin's does on their slim waisted rubber soles. I've also used the technique with Miyagi Kogyo before. Difference with Saint Crispin's is of course that it's not Goodyear welted, but handwelted. The cement part is the same.

This needs to be repeated.

 

[emptym]

No, I saw exactly what they alleged. My point was that however well intentioned @shoefan57 may be, I believe him to be mistaken.

It’s absolutely bonkers to allege that Edward Green would be rolling out a fully cemented shoe with a faux welt priced and represented dishonestly as GWY based on the claim (presented with zero evidence) that Crockett Jones does it so EG must be doing as well.

Sounds good. I interpreted @wdahab as saying he saw the shoes at the Paris EG shop having the same construction shoefan57 was talking about, but he may have been (probably was) talking about the kind Sutefan mentioned.

Both seem to be cost-cutting measures to me though. I have a couple pairs of AS handgrades with Dainite soles (about 12 yrs old), and they're both stitched through the soles. One even has a midsole, but the stitching goes through the welt, midsole, and Dainite outsole.

Incidentally, I thought at one point St. Crispin's actually did a closed/hidden channel on their Dainite soled shoes. That would be ideal, if it's possible. I'd imagine it would be very difficult.

@Vamp-ire, the repair looks good to me. I'd forget about it and enjoy the bag.

 

[JohnMRobie]

Sounds good. I interpreted @wdahab as saying he saw the shoes at the Paris EG shop having the same construction shoefan57 was talking about, but he may have been (probably was) talking about the kind Sutefan mentioned.

Both seem to be cost-cutting measures to me though. I have a couple pairs of AS handgrades with Dainite soles (about 12 yrs old), and they're both stitched through the soles. One even has a midsole, but the stitching goes through the welt, midsole, and Dainite outsole.

Incidentally, I thought at one point St. Crispin's actually did a closed/hidden channel on their Dainite soled shoes. That would be ideal, if it's possible. I'd imagine it would be very difficult.

I interpreted @wdahab’s comment to be talking about a rubber sole attached to a midsole, not about a fully cemented construction. Without cutting the shoe open though there is no way to confirm that there’s not a welted midsole there.

My understanding is that there are certain soles that aren’t possible to stitch through when you attach them and are always cemented to a midsole. Wedge soles come to mind. If I get a hand welted work boot with a wedge sole cemented to a midsole that doesn’t make it a cemented shoe. We also wouldn’t say that a hand welted shoe that has a topy added is a cemented piece of garbage either since the internal construction is the same.

Given shoefans description it sounds to me like he misunderstood the CJ workers to me. He emphasized that they’re still able to be resoled which would be the case because you just pop off the outsole and the midsole, welt and gemming stay intact (at least as long as the glue holding the gemming to the shoe holds up) like a topy.

Re: dainite, I’ve been told that dainite can’t have a flap cut open to have hidden stitching which is why they cut a channel for the stitching to sit deeper in some cases but not a closed channel.

 

[Sutefan]

Sounds good. I interpreted @wdahab as saying he saw the shoes at the Paris EG shop having the same construction shoefan57 was talking about, but he may have been (probably was) talking about the kind Sutefan mentioned.

Both seem to be cost-cutting measures to me though. I have a couple pairs of AS handgrades with Dainite soles (about 12 yrs old), and they're both stitched through the soles. One even has a midsole, but the stitching goes through the welt, midsole, and Dainite outsole.

Incidentally, I thought at one point St. Crispin's actually did a closed/hidden channel on their Dainite soled shoes. That would be ideal, if it's possible. I'd imagine it would be very difficult.

@Vamp-ire, the repair looks good to me. I'd forget about it and enjoy the bag.

You can't really hand stitch a rubber sole, or make a channel stitch. A hand stitch would be ugly, so most bespoke makers would use a machine for that. I agree it would be nice, though.

To some extent, one could argue that cementing the sole to a midsole is actually just an extra, innecessary step that is increasing work and adding an extra process to the production.
Find nothing wrong with doing so on shoes for a technical reason. I also think there's a sense of functionality in it: slimmer waist and easier resoles at third parties. I've chosen this before.
If someone wants to buy a EG from me, dissect it, and finds the welting is a fake welt (full cemented with no functionality). I'd pay them double back. If it's not I would expect them to write a humble description of the truth here.

 

[jischwar]

You can't really hand stitch a rubber sole, or make a channel stitch. A hand stitch would be ugly, so most bespoke makers would use a machine for that. I agree it would be nice, though.

To some extent, one could argue that cementing the sole to a midsole is actually just an extra, innecessary step that is increasing work and adding an extra process to the production.
Find nothing wrong with doing so on shoes for a technical reason. I also think there's a sense of functionality in it: slimmer waist and easier resoles at third parties. I've chosen this before.
If someone wants to buy a EG from me, dissect it, and finds the welting is a fake welt (full cemented with no functionality). I'd pay them double back. If it's not I would expect them to write a humble description of the truth here.

I vote @shoefan57 does it 🤣🤣

 

[wdahab]

Yeah, all I can vouch for having seen was that the outsole wasn't stitched, nothing about the rest of the construction. And the boots were veldtschoen as well (as are these boots I have on order with Stefan) so the welt itself is hidden anyway.

In my best assumption is that everything about the construction is the same except for that one detail. And I would be willing to bet that this change is coming to the rest of the veldtschoen line, for resoling purposes.

 

[BColl_Has_Too_Many_Shoes]

You can't really hand stitch a rubber sole, or make a channel stitch. A hand stitch would be ugly, so most bespoke makers would use a machine for that. I agree it would be nice, though.

To some extent, one could argue that cementing the sole to a midsole is actually just an extra, innecessary step that is increasing work and adding an extra process to the production.
Find nothing wrong with doing so on shoes for a technical reason. I also think there's a sense of functionality in it: slimmer waist and easier resoles at third parties. I've chosen this before.
If someone wants to buy a EG from me, dissect it, and finds the welting is a fake welt (full cemented with no functionality). I'd pay them double back. If it's not I would expect them to write a humble description of the truth here.

Notice he said, "wants to buy a EG from me". A business man here folks 👍.

 

[Vamp-ire]

Update on the EG briefcase repairs, sent it to a cobbler recommended by my personal one, nationwide known company. Ended up feeling the repairs were unsatisfactory seconded by my cobbler who referred me. Want opinions.

Anyone going to throw their opinion?

 

[Vamp-ire]

Sounds good. I interpreted @wdahab as saying he saw the shoes at the Paris EG shop having the same construction shoefan57 was talking about, but he may have been (probably was) talking about the kind Sutefan mentioned.

Both seem to be cost-cutting measures to me though. I have a couple pairs of AS handgrades with Dainite soles (about 12 yrs old), and they're both stitched through the soles. One even has a midsole, but the stitching goes through the welt, midsole, and Dainite outsole.

Incidentally, I thought at one point St. Crispin's actually did a closed/hidden channel on their Dainite soled shoes. That would be ideal, if it's possible. I'd imagine it would be very difficult.

@Vamp-ire, the repair looks good to me. I'd forget about it and enjoy the bag.

I just saw this, my main issue is the loops being off by 1/4th of an inch. I think you can see it in the photos

 

[Mr_Spud]

I just saw this, my main issue is the loops being off by 1/4th of an inch. I think you can see it in the photos

You bargain hunt, you not always gonna end up with the optimal outcome. Someone once told me that after a while you won't be able to remember how much you spent on something that gives you enjoyment, so my advice would be that if you don't see yourself enjoying using the bag then get rid of it. No amount of validation via this web site or another will help if you can't stand to look at the damn thing on a daily basis.