 Are you just getting into quality heritage style stitched boots and fancy some of the brogue wingtip styles you've seen on social media? You know like this Joseph Cheney tweed boot for example or the Tricker Stowe or maybe the American Alan Edmonds Dalton boot. Then you went online to check them out and found that they cost you as $500 and above. What? Why so much? Keep watching. I'll show you a viable alternative for your first brogue wingtip boot. G'day, welcome to Bootlossophy and if we haven't met yet, my name is Tech. I acknowledge the traditional custodians of this land that I live on, the Wodget People. This is the third part of my series called New to Quality Boots. The series is aimed at people new to quality heritage style stitched boots and who have only experienced the cheaper fashion centric glue construction boots from shopping centres and other chain retail stores. It's a big move. If you spend two or three hundred Australian dollars on a pair of Echo or America or Europe and you're used to Timberland for example for a couple of hundred US dollars, you'll be shocked to learn that quality boots can cost upwards of three hundred US dollars, well upwards and brogue wingtips in particular can be much more than that. The difference is in the quality of construction as well as the quality of the natural materials used in these stitched boots that can be resold, be more durable and patina or wear in such a way that they age gracefully and beautifully. In this video I'm focusing on brogue wingtip boots, the most popular currently seeming to be the Trickers Stowe boot, a prime example of the English country boot style but certainly not on its own with the American Ellen Edmonds Dalton boot and other English styles like the Granson Fred and like this lovely Joseph Cheney Tweed boot which you can see in my full review up there. But if you did investigate the Trickers Stowe you'll have seen it sells for five hundred and eighty five pound sterling. This Tweed boot sells for four hundred and seventy five pounds. The Ellen Edmonds Dalton sells for five hundred US dollars, even Granson re-establishing its old heritage quality as a mid-range boot manufacturer brings out the Made in India Fred boot at around five hundred euros. So if you really like the brogue wingtip style and you want to take the first step into Goodyear welter boots instead of glued boots it's a big jump. However there is an alternative for you to take that first step but before we look at the viable alternative let's take a look at the style. Brogue boots or boots with holes punched through in a regular pattern and wingtip boots, boots showing the winged panels from toe to the sides of the vamp have a strong connection with each other in history. Those are a 16th century invention of Irish or Scottish origin that were designed for walking through the countryside on marshy boggy land. The perforations were originally functional rather than decorative. They let the water out as you trudged the bog so you didn't end up with a boot full of water. That's why especially in the UK they're still classed as country boots and in the category of country boots are meant to be worn in the countryside as opposed to in the city. Of course that 18th 19th century distinction has long gone. Today they can be worn with great versatility even with a suit because in dark colors they can be worn formally or they can be worn casually with slacks, chinos, wool or flannel pants and tweeds or jeans and t-shirts depending on the upper leather. Wing tips on the other hand merely refer to that wing design and not all wing tips actually have holes in them but eventually wing tips and brogues came together as full brogues and nowadays what we call wing tips are almost certainly full brogues. That is they have the wing tip design and they have the brogue perforations. As I said a good brogue boot made in one of the stitched construction methods like Goodyear welting or stitched down or felt shown construction can cost a long way north of three or four hundred US dollars. The most famous examples are in the 500s. By the way if you want to see the difference between all the ways boots are constructed you can catch this video up here. So if you like the style what is an entry-level boot that you can buy and try to see if you like the style and then decide if you actually like the feel of a welted boot because moving up does take a bit of getting used to if you've only had the fashion centric cemented construction style boots. They tend to be heavier they will take a few days or more to break in and allow the sole and stiff welt to flex as well as allow the thicker foregrain leathers to mold your movements and flex around your ankles and the top of your vamp. It makes sense to not jump right in and spend several hundred dollars more than you used to spending. And this is the alternative entry-level brogue wingtip boot. This is the simply named wingtip boot by Thursday Boot Company. Now this is not meant to be a deep review I've already done that and you can check it out here but what I will do in this video is tell you a bit about Thursday the construction of these boots and why they can be your first entry into brogue wingtip boots. Thursday is a relatively new quality heritage style boot company founded in 2014 when the two founders couldn't find quality boots they wanted at an affordable price and decided that they could start a boot company to make them. They started with a Kickstarter campaign and history was made as they founded an internet-based direct-to-consumer company making most of their boots out of one of the shoemaking capitals in the Americas, Leon and Mexico. Keeping infrastructure, wages and material costs down and removing the middlemen retailers they offer most of their boots at the US $200 mark and this wingtip boot sells for US $235. Taking a look at the construction and materials it's made using the Goodyear welter method of construction. Considered a gold standard by boot enthusiasts. You can check out my video deep diving into Goodyear welter construction up here but basically a thin strip of leather called the welt is sewn onto the uppers and insole on the inside of the boot while it is also sewn through on the outside to the midsole and sometimes outsole as in this case. Thursday uses a rubber studded outsole on this boot. It's modeled after the UK made and very famous day night outsole and it's pretty good for grip and durability as well as low profile for being dressy. Inside the boot some of the cost savings when you compare these two traditional brands start to become apparent. Boots like the Stowe and the Dalton and these two will tend to have leather midsole and insole and the cavity that's caused by the welt going around the edge of the boot will be filled with natural cork. Traditionalists will tell you that that's the real gold standard because it's all natural will last a long time as you know leather molds and doesn't break and over time your feet settle in and it feels made just for you. Thursday does use a real cork filling layer and a leather midsole in this boot but the insole is a foam based insole. It's a little cheaper but it also means comfort straight out of the box. As a first time wearer of Heritage Stowe boots the foam inside means that these feel like the soft foam based boots you're used to wearing and you don't have to struggle with as much of a break in as with all leather component boots. The downside is that the foam will break down over time and I'm told will then start to feel a little lumpy. But honestly it will take some time to do that and by then you probably need a resole so you can fix it all at the same time. And that's the big advantage over cement construction boots where the soles are just glued on. Even if they're molded and fake stitched to look like these they're still cement construction and they're still glued on. When the soles wear out on your cement construction boots you throw them away. When these wear out you can take them to a good cobbler who can remove the stitches, remove the worn out sole and replace and re-stitch it. And if the insole is troubling you at that time get it done as well and you'll have a boot that could last you decades as long as you take care of these uppers. For all that these are priced at US $235 and Thursday have never raised your prices even after the pandemic. I don't know how they do that to be honest. For that reason alone that makes this a viable alternative as a first-time entry purchase because there are no other quality properly stitch constructed brogue wingtip boots for that price. Other reasons as a first buy the initial comfort out of the box, the looks elegant and sleetly dressy, the full leather lining that's comfortable and and helps to thicken up the uppers and the use of a steel shank between the heel and the ball of the foot that provides arch support as well as torsional stability. This has all the attributes of a higher priced brogue boot. This boot is in what Thursday calls dark oak leather from the well-known Lafargue tannery in León. It's a good firm leather measuring about 2 millimeters thickness which is about average for lower price range quality boots. It has a hand burnished finish so adds to the stylishness of this style. Caring for this leather is simple but put away the thought of hard waxes like tins of Kiwi. Full grain leather needs to be fed rather than waxed over so the term is conditioning. You can use any quality conditioner but my go-to for smooth leathers is Venetian shoe cream which conditions the leather but also has enough waxes in it to give it a reasonable shine. Condition it at least a couple of times a year maybe more depending on frequency of wear and what conditions you wear them in like you know rain and snow which doesn't happen here in Australia. When you do condition it get a good horsehair brush first and brush off the dirt dust and grime. Then put a light coat of Venetian on if you want put a couple of light coats allowing to dry between coats and then when it dries to a haze give it a really good brushing to polish it up and remove the excess. If you want you can put a thin coat of cream polish after the conditioning like I use a Tarago product which is a mid-range price product rather than it's more expensive Sophia cousin the same company. I would use a neutral cream because of the hand burnish finish. You don't want a dark brown cream polish to wipe out the difference in the shades that you get in the shaft and along the the toe box. If you really want to shine you can put a smear of hard wax. I use a damp sponge to pick up the wax from the tin and then dab and then smooth it over and then again let it haze and brush. An important aspect of boot care is to brush it regularly even if you don't condition it every time that you brush it. People say brush after everywhere but I'm not so Catholic about it and and I brush maybe once a week or once a month. Brushing is important though because the everyday grit and sand and dirt can accumulate especially if on waxy leathers. They can dry on and then eventually scratch and crack your leather and if they get really dirty like say muddy dirty wipe the mud off with a damp rag and then if you really have to you can use a saddle soap. Thursday offers the wingtip boot in seven different uppers leathers and colors and two of them on a crepe sole rather than the studded sole. Boot care will be different between the different leathers but you can ask Thursday what to do. Their customer service is usually very good. Before I finish let me talk about sizing. If you're new to quality boots you'd almost certainly have been buying boots and shoes in what is roughly your true size. However it would be best if you go to a store any shoe store and get yourself measured on a Brannock device to learn your true size. A Brannock device is one of those aluminum things that I'm sure you've stood on before. You stand on it and they slide leavers and you get measured. You see the thing is that in most heritage boots they size large particularly American heritage boots and the advice is to take a half size down. So if you measure a 9 for example take an 8.5. However with these Thursday wingtip boots the last or the mold that they used to build it on is shaped long and sleek but narrow. So in this case I was advised to take my true size. Now Thursday are changing some of their lasts so it's advisable when you buy this to check with them. Give them a few examples of your sneaker size and whatever brand you wear as well as some well-known dress shoes that you wear. Give them some examples. They can advise you on the fit based on those. So there you have it. Now this has been my opinion of what you can do if you're new to quality stitched boots. If you like the look of them of a brogue wingtip but you can't afford to or you don't particularly want to spend four or five hundred US dollars on a boot that you're not really sure you like or maybe you're not sure you wear very much. The Thursday wingtip makes it an affordable option to try. See if you like heritage construction boots and see if you want to go on with them and buy some more. I'm not sponsored by Thursday so this is my personal opinion. I mean who knows one day you may have a hundred pairs in your collection and start to make YouTube boot reviews. Anyway I hope you like the video and if you do please click on the like button below because that helps me out. If you're not subscribed please do that. Click on subscribe down there and YouTube will tell you when I bring up more videos about this generous and interesting boot world that you're about to join. Welcome. Until the next time take care and see you soon.