Thrift Store Find - Vintage Shoes

One of my hobbies apart from obsessing over DeeR shoes is to go thrift store shopping. I find it alot more enjoyable than shopping at new places mainly you if you know what you're looking for you can purchase some really quality stuff at bargain prices. People don't realise that these stores aren't just places you can go in and buy a really bad outfit to wear to some fancy dress party. If you move aside all of the polyester double knit safari suits and really fat gaudy extra flammable ties and shirts, you can find some really classic stuff.


Like these captoe balmoral shoes by Julius Marlow. Its the same style of shoe I posted a while back but this was is a little bit different.

I usually tend not to think much about Julius Marlow shoes  as most of what I seem in the stores now doesn't really interest me. I quickly did a google search on them and the brand or company seems to be owned by the super mega corporation pacific brands.

These shoes are spectacular finds because it shows me that Australia, like most places in the world use to be able to make some really good quality shoes. This was before they moved everything to that new factory called China. The shoes are goodyear welted, which means that a strip of leather (called a welt) is attached to the upper and then the sole is attached to these piece of leather. The way they make most shoes now is with glue and lots of it. This then gets bonded to a piece of PVC or EVA or something similar and sometimes this has fake bits molded into it to resemble a stitched welt or a stacked leather heel.

 Look at the sole above. Here you can see the channel with the goodyear stitching. What is more amazing is the heel. Where's the rubber? The plastic? This baby is all nails. This is the traditional way of making a heel. Few makers employ this method of construction even with the high end English and Italian shoe makers.

I have no idea how old these shoes. I don't know when Julius Marlow stopped production is Australia. Im sure it was probably the late 90s as it seems like everything post 2000 was being shipped out from China. Judging from the old school font, and heel pattern, they could be late 1969s or 1970s.  If there's anyone out there reading my blog who used to work at the factory, or otherwise involved with the company I would love to hear from you.