 G'day, welcome to my channel, Boot Lossophy, where I review boots. My name is Tech. I live in Perth in Western Australia, so I'd like to acknowledge the traditional custodians where I live, the Wajip people of the Nungan Nation. Today, I'm taking a look at this pair of Parkhurst boots, the Allen model in CF Steads Gaucho Moose. This pair of boots is the Allen boot by Parkhurst boots, and in this make-up it's in Charles F. Steads Gaucho Moose leather. As you can see, it's a typical six-inch-high American heritage style plain-toe service boot. Boondocker-style single-piece backstay and external counter cover, open-style lacing derby quarters, flat-block heel, and a commando lugged out sole. The Moose leather gives it a mushroom-brown, camo-matte appearance. It's sleek and generous at the same time with a toe-box shape that's rounded but not chunky. It's very much in the style and family of service boot designs that came out of American small brand bootmakers from the 2010s onwards. This makes pairing outfits with this boot really easy. Treating it as a casual service boot and in this leather with no pretensions to the versatility of smooth leathers befitting dressier outfits or even the smarter end of casual, it's clearly more casual than most. Pairing it with outfits like you're on a relaxed weekend is what you do. They really go well with any kind of denim jeans and in fact, probably those that are less uniformly dark, you know, fades, straight legs, wearing with t-shirts or casual button-down shirts and jackets or tweed and brown and tan blazers. The earthy uppers mean that they can also go with black, brown and other neutral or earth-tone colors. You'd wear them with more casual button-up and button-down shirts and while as I said you can pull on a blazer, I think they're probably better with just a jumper and a long coat in winter or short bomber jackets or leather jackets in between seasons weather. This is not a boot I'd stress over what to pair it with. It goes with everything except a suit or even really smart business casual. Let's talk about Parkhurst Brand. Only a couple of years ago, it wasn't a popularly talked about brand. New into the world of U.S. heritage boots. Everyone knew Thursday. Going deeper, sure, Red Wing, starting to look around. Oh yeah, wow, Grant Stone. Then you went to Weitz and Weiberg and Nix and those in the specials or handmaids. Only a small fanatically loyal band knew about and talked about Parkhurst. But that grew a momentum. And now I think it's widely shown and discussed on Facebook and Instagram. Ironically, it started growing when Parkhurst almost shut down during the pandemic. But let's take a step back. Parkhurst was founded by stock analyst turned bootmaker Andrew Savisco in 2018 when he decided to make a heritage style boot that combined rugged make with versatile sleepness. At the same time, he wanted to help preserve the American bootmaking skills and sought to use American-sourced materials or at least use American suppliers of products he needed from outside the U.S. All of Parkhurst's designs reflect that aesthetic. Slimmer, sleeker lasts and dressy designs but using rugged casual leathers and rugged natural welts and outdoor soles. To do this, Parkhurst relied on small batch manufacturing because of the cost in minimum purchase orders. So they bought the leathers, made up the boots in small batches and when the material was gone, they introduced another leather. This model revolved around just a few designs. The Capto Richmond and the Plainto Allen in particular. But in the past, they have made a perforated Capto boot, even a full brogue wingtip. And recently they have introduced an indie style mocktoe and a Chelsea boot. You can look at my review of another Parkhurst boot in Seidel double shot leather up there. But just as they started to get going and get noticed, COVID hit Parkhurst hard. Andrew had contracted a factory in upstate New York, the former PW Minor factory, which had itself just been rescued at the time. But the pandemic meant that the factory was unable to keep up manufacturing and Parkhurst itself was unable to secure supply chains to bring in materials in time. This meant, for example, that while the uppers would say American leathers were being made, production had to stop for months while they waited for nails from somewhere else or day night or its hide souls that had to make their way across the Atlantic. So in the last couple of years, Parkhurst ran with very constricted production and offerings. In the midst of that, Andrew knew that he had to pivot. So he was introduced to a Spanish factory and new suppliers of uppers, leathers and was able to secure a manufacturing base in Spain. Americans, and maybe Andrew himself may not like to hear this, but honestly, for those products of contracted factories, I found that when forced to move from US small factories to European factories, quality actually improves, mostly because those European factories didn't have the large scale factory closures that plagued the US during the 80s and 90s and they actually retained their skilled craftspeople. Anyway, Andrew has been able to survive the pandemic, despite being a small manufacturer. And the name and reputation of Parkhurst has, I seem to notice, actually risen since. So I hope he continues onwards because it's a brand I love and I support. But now let's turn to the construction of these boots. I'll start at the bottom and work my way up. At the very bottom is a commando lugged rubber full length outsole. It's branded Parkhurst, but made for Parkhurst by an European supplier. For those who know Vibram, this will remind you of the Vibram commando sole. The commando lugs are splayed out from the centre to the outside edges with star-shaped lugs in the centre. The pattern gives a great grip on soft and sandy terrain, as well as over rocky ground. Over wet, slippery, polished or smooth paving concrete, not wonderful because of the density of the rubber. It feels a very similar rubber composition to the Vibram commando outsole and with a good enough shock absorption quality, but firm enough to be slippery when wet on a smooth surface. It's connected through a Benz leather midsole and a leather welt to the uppers. This is the 360-degree Goodyear welt construction form of construction. You can see a detailed video about it up here, but basically a welt, which is a flat strip of leather goes all the way around the edge of the boot. It's sewn to the inside on the inside edge and on the outside, it's sewn through the midsole to the outsole. This means that it's more water-resisting than, say, a blank stitch construction where the uppers are sewn directly to the outsole. In Goodyear welting, there aren't any stitch holes that go directly from the inside to the outside. This also means that it's easier to re-sole. Your cobbler cuts through the welt stitching, peels off the also-glued outsole, glues on a new outsole and then restitches the welt stitch, all without disturbing the connection of the welt to the midsole to the uppers. In this case, Parkus uses a split-reverse welt. That's where the flat welt is split halfway through the middle. The lower part of the split is sewn onto the insole like normal. The upper part of the split is flanged upwards and then pushed against the side of the uppers, while the outside of the welt is sewn to the midsole and to the outsole like normal. The upwards flange acts as a further barrier against moisture getting into the boot. Moving on upwards inside the boot, there is a cork filler filling in the cavity in the middle of the sole caused by the 5mm ring of welt going around the outside. The 5mm or so patch of cork also provides comfort when put on top of the leather insole inside the boot. The rubber, leather, cork, leather layers are pure gold. They breathe, not the rubber obviously, they are flexible and the inside leather cork, leather layers mould the shape of your feet with the pressure of wear. You end up with a pair of boots that feel carved at the bottom of your feet, kind of like softer Birkenstocks. Inside the boot, on the footbed is a leather branded sock heel liner that runs from the heel to under your arch. Oh, and talking about arches, I forgot to say that this has a steel shank that's a thin strip of steel that's embedded in the cork layer and runs between the heel and the ball of the foot. A shank provides stability in the gap, reinforcement if you like and stops your arch collapsing into that gap. Too much of that and you get very tired feet at the end of the day. Parkers used to use fiberglass shanks, which I actually prefer due to their non-ferrous ability to get through airport metal detectors. But many people seem to prefer steel shanks because, well, I guess they're steel, even though they often rust and break. Inside the boot is leather lined in the vamp but unlined in the shaft. The lace facings and the top of the collar are reinforced by a second piece of the same uppers leather, so they're double layered at those points. The toe box is either unstructured or very lightly structured. The heel counters of Parker's boots used to be celastic, that's a thermoplastic material, but since the move to the Spanish factory, they are now full-grain, veg-tanned leather, a win for the move. There are five brass eyelets and three solid-feeling brass bead hooks. The tongue is semi-gusseted up to between the fourth and the fifth eyelet, so that improves the water and dirt resistance and also that dreaded slipping tongue phenomena. Now we come to the uppers leather. Isn't it gorgeous? It's a soft, supple, waxily-tanned full-grain leather, grainy, matte in texture, spotted, marked, scarred and veined. So what is it? This is Charles F. Stead's gaucho mousse. Stead is an English tannery specializing in suede and is famous for their soft, waterproof suede and their waxy-commander wax suede tannages. In recent years, they've also specialized in exotic leathers, kudu from the Southern African antelope like kudu, shrunken suede like Rambler and Mohawk, and this tannage, their mousse leather. This mousse is actually a Scandinavian elk, so you're not wearing ball-winkle, just a distant cousin. I have another pair of Parker's boots in their Capto Richmond design that is also gaucho mousse, but the two are so different. Go and take a look at my review of that boot up here and see how much lighter, less mottled and way more unmarked than this iteration is. I actually don't know why it's different. Andrew said he wasn't sure. Maybe just the difference at the batch in the tannery or maybe the batch of animals. But whatever it is, I'm glad because I really like this version. Did I say it's soft and supple? That, along with Parker's last, which I'll talk about when I talk about fit, make this boot immediately comfortable out of the box. Finally, QC. I always had small issues with the New York factory. They were small, there was the odd loose stitch, the way the ends of the welt joined, not perfectly matched. They were small and it seemed churlish to even mention them. These, the QC is much better. It's still a rugged boot, but it's been put together by people who are careful. What did I say about European factories managing to hang on to their experienced staff? As for how to care for this moose leather, it's pretty simple. It's a rough casual leather and doesn't need babying. But of course you don't want it dried out either. So the secret is, as usual, keep it clean from dirt and grime and especially that grainy type of sand and stuff, which is the enemy of any leather because it can cut and grind into the leather. Brush often and regularly. When the boot feels like it needs conditioning, people recommend something like Smith's leather balm or Venetian shoe cream, but I found that with dry matte leathers like Kudu and Moose, those conditioners can wax up the surface and spoil that matte dry skin look and make it a little bit more shiny. I've had a lot of success conditioning this, this kind of leather with Big Four. It doesn't soak in and darken the leather and it doesn't leave a waxy finish. Now, because it doesn't soak in much, you may need to condition it more often, but honestly, this kind of leather lesses more. Just don't let it dry out. I said that this was comfortable out of the box. Now, to my mind, comfort is a factor of three things. Getting the right size, the last, the uppers' leather, or in the fourth thing, the sole construction. These Parker's boots tick all the boxes if you get the size right. The last, which is the foot or boot shape wooden or plastic mold used by the boot maker to stretch the uppers around, so as to form the shape of the boot is Andrew's own design, his 602 last, so named because he named it after the registration number of the World War II landing ship tank his grandfather served on. A little segue, when Parker started, Andrew used a last he called the 18 last. It had a more almond shaped toe and more proportionately wider all around the rest of the boot. Then he designed and swapped to the original 602 last, which was a combination last, meaning that it was narrow at the heel and waist, I think in a C width, but then opened up to an E width at the ball of the foot and coming back down a little to a D in the toe box. The 602 toe box was also rounded and had more room. Then when he moved production to Spain, he created a modified 602 or 602 M last, which he uses for his Chelsea and Mocteau boots. They also adapted the old 602 last and provided more volume and other tweaks in this model. This other new 602 last is not the same as the 602 M, nor is it the same as the older New York factory 602. This new 602 last was launched in January 2023 and has a bit more room in it in certain areas. Andrew said that oftentimes his customers think they need a single E width, but he says when they put these on, they enjoy the fit because the toe box opens out to a single E width. You know, I love the old 602 last because along with Grant Stone's Leo last, I thought it was perfect for my feet. I was wrong. This one, this one is the perfect last for me. I think you like it too, simply because the combination last as adapted fits your foot anatomically. You don't have to squish your toes into a two-sleek almond shape and you don't have to feel squashed in at the ball and waist in one single width shape. So last is sorted. Size, I take a half down from Branick, sorted. Parkers don't have different widths on all models. So if you're concerned, contact Andrew who is really good at sorting out what you need if you tell him some of what other boots and shoes that you fit in. Now the uppers and sole construction I've already talked about in construction, sorted. Comfort, sorted. Excellent. How much does all that comfort cost? Parkers is a web-based direct-to-consumer company and on their website, these, when they're available as they do come and go, these are listed at the mid-500 Aussie dollars or the high 300s in US dollars. That price compares with some Red Wing boots, with some Grant Stone offerings, casual or in that range as well, as well as many others. So you can say that that is the sweet spot for mid-priced US heritage style boots. Australia doesn't make this type of boot. There's a few Goodyear-Welted models. They come close, but not really. So as a mid-range heritage Goodyear-Welted service boot that's both versatile and casual wear and dressy, it's definitely in the ballpark. Quality of material and construction is good, but I can't say much better than the others I mentioned about the same. What puts it apart in my view is the aesthetic. It's a service boot that's designed sleek, but built rugged. I have said in the past, this is the Mini-Me Viberg service boot. Not quite the built quality, but it looks like a Viberg service boot in their rugged leathers at half the price. I think they're worth the value. So in summary, great looking boot. Good materials and uppers from one of the world's leading tenories. The price is right, QC is good. From the con side, maybe not having different widths on all the models if your feet are quirky. Maybe not as versatile because it's clearly a casual boot in this makeup. Commander Sol, grippy in the great outdoors, maybe a little slippery in shopping center wet floors. Tell me what you think in the comments below. And of course, click on like, do it now. And if you're not subscribed, don't even think about it. Go, click on subscribe now. I'm taking a look at some Truman boots coming up and there are some interesting English boots on the cards. Click on subscribe, take care and I'll see you soon.