When it comes to leather, few tanneries can match the quality and craftsmanship of Horween Leather Company. Based in Chicago and founded in 1905, Horween has been producing some of the finest leather on Earth for over a century, making not only the most popular Shell Cordovan and boot leather (Chromexcel), but also dominating football … Read more
Started in 1946, Minnetonka is a family owned footwear company based out of Minneapolis, Minnesota and currently operated by CEO, David Miller, the grandson of co-founder Philip W. Miller. The Midwestern shoe company has made the moccasin the cornerstone of their business, with a myriad of styles and variations available, ranging from pieces with traditional … Read more
More and more American brands are outsourcing their production overseas, and look, that doesn’t necessarily mean their products are becoming lower quality. Good and bad products are made in every country, and the producers’ nationality has a lot less to do with it than their business practices. But that doesn’t mean there’s no reason to … Read more
I was fortunate enough, in my own adventure, to find Ashland Leather. Recently I was also fortunate enough to literally find Ashland Leather, the business itself, as it is located on an obscured offshoot of Elston Avenue in Chicago about a half mile north of the Horween Leather tannery. I was fortunate, too, to be … Read more
Everyone knows that a great boot starts with great leather. But where does that leather come from? It starts with the expertise of the tannery, where raw hides are transformed into the highest quality leather through the alchemy of the tanning process. There are countless of tanneries out there — really, we’ve reviewed everything from … Read more
For those coming from YouTube, the discount code is just beneath the video↓ Joshua Bingaman had a storied history in footwear before launching Helm. His career had included managing (then selling) a chain of footwear stores and by the time he started this Austin-based outfit, he had racked up twenty years in the footwear industry. … Read more
Click around the internet and most articles on leather types split them into three categories: full grain, top grain, and genuine leather. Full grain is made from the top layer of the animal’s hide, top grain has the top layer sanded away, and genuine leather is reviled the most, since it has no grain and … Read more