 G'day, how are you going? If you're new here, this channel is called Boot Lossophy, and it's all about boots. And my name is Tech. Welcome. I'm recording on Wajik Country, Nungabuja, in Perth, Western Australia, and I recognise the traditional owners of this land. This is the RM Williams Gardener Boot. Let's take a look at it. Let's start by looking at the history of the bootmaker, RM Williams. If you've seen my earlier review of the RM Williams Comfort Craftsman, you can see it up here. Then you know a bit about the history of RM Williams. But for those of you who are new here, RM Williams was founded in 1932 by Reginald Murray, or RM Williams. RM was an itinerant labourer working the sheep and cattle stations of South Australia, where he learned leatherworking skills, principally how to make saddles. It seems RM took to leatherwork like adductor water, so he decided to make a living out of making leather goods. He started a shop in the work shed of his father's house in the suburb of Prospect, north of Adelaide. Sounds like the guys who started Microsoft in the garage, right? RM's father's address, number 5 Prospect Street, is still embroidered on the pull tabs of the boots today. If you're ever in Adelaide, it's maybe a 15 minute drive from the centre of town, and it's now the site of RM Williams Heritage Museum. RM found that his most popular product turned out to be his boots, popular with farmers and livestock station hands as a work and riding boot. They were extremely durable, made from a single piece of leather, with only one seam up the back. The company grew and made RM a rich man. As his boots became popular in the cities around Australia, RM sold the business in 1988. He passed away in 1993. In 1989, RM Williams opened a London store and in the 1990s the brand took off internationally. In 2013, the company was sold to LVMH, Louis Vuitton's luxury conglomerate brand. And then in 2020, the company was brought back into private Australian ownership by mining magnet Andrew Forrest. The RM Williams Gardener is a Chelsea boot, like most of RM Williams' footwear range. The Chelsea boot was designed from the mid 1800s, designed by Queen Victoria's bookmaker as a walking and riding boot. They were used mainly as riding and work boots from that time. That was what RM made in the 1930s, but they became really popular in the 1960s when they were worn by pop music bands like The Beatles. For a while they were even known as Beatle Boots. But since the swinging 60s centered in the London suburb of Chelsea, they became forever known as Chelsea Boots. I guess if not for the Beatles, they may have been called after Queen Victoria's bootmaker's name. In fact, when he first advertised them, they were called Jay Sparks Hall's patent elastic ankle boots. Catchy. As a Chelsea boot, the Gardener is a six inch boot, has a simple block heel, a flat sole and these elastic panels on the sides called goreng, or simply elastic gusset. These boots are made from one piece of leather, the original hole cut, which gives them very elegant lines because you're not distracted by the seams at the vamp or under the goreng. RM Williams makes 11 versions of a Chelsea boot. The most famous is the craftsman, which I've also reviewed. Mixing up Upper's leather and different soles on those 11 models, at the time of filming, RM Williams shows 63 different makeups on the Aussie website. The Gardener is different from most of them, different at least from the craftsman variants, because it is designed as a work boot. There are three fundamental differences. The first is the leather, usually offered in a greasy kit leather, black or brown. It's very soft, but firm, full of oils. And so it's quite waterproof. The second is the rounded toe. Where the craftsman has a chisel-shaped toe, these are rounded for more comfort when you're digging or kneeling. The third fundamental difference is the sole. In this case, a thicker rubber sole than on any craftsman, with these deep V-bar lugs or cleats to provide grip without picking up much dirt or mud. A luxury version of the Gardener, selling for $100 more, come in black or brown chrome excel from Horween Tanner in Chicago. And those are on a Vibram Commando lug sole. Designed as a work boot, you can clearly wear them as work boots in a workshop or in a factory with these oil-resistant soles, as long as you don't need steel toes. Being called the Gardener, you'd be right in thinking you can wear these gardening with these thick soles to help you kick down a shovel. But I have to say, as a $600 boot, you'd probably have to have these as your sole work boot, pun intended, or be working in a very upper-glass garden or a host and a popular lifestyle TV show. As a TV gardening guru on camera, you'd probably wear these with RM Williams' Moleskine trousers and a Czech shirt. Oh, and don't forget your Acubra hat. For most of us, though, we'd probably pay respect to their price and wear them as very comfortable casual boots. As casual boots, you can wear them anywhere and with anything. You can wear them in any everyday activity, including going to an office, where a suit is not required. When I first bought this pair about four years ago, I wore them on a trip out bush in the Northern Territory. I ended up after our meetings with the local Aboriginal community out on an escarpment where this mad anthropologist was camping. As we had about three hours before I had to leave for my charter flight at the airstrip, he suggested that we go for a walk in the bush, which I thought was a great idea. Plenty of time, he said, it'll only be an hour or so when I'll get you back to the plane. Anyway, after two hours, we were at the bottom of a rock-sided gorge at the bottom of his camp and vehicle. And you realize that to walk the long way up would take us out of our time. So we climbed the rock face. He and his technical hiking boots and me and my brand new RM Williams $600 leather boots. Anyway, I came up fine, it came up fine, bar some scratches to the toes of these boots. Still there, and I made my plane. So these boots are tough and they can be worn in any situation, but they are casual boots. So if you want to wear Chelsea boots with a suit, go with a craftsman. This particular model is in the Greasy Kip brown leather. RM Williams' website doesn't say where this leather is sourced or tanned from, but they have sourced the hides before from Australia, New Zealand, or the US and France with a recent refocus on Australian hides. Greasy Kip leather is generally from a large and older beast and produces a heavier chrome tanned leather infused with oils during tanning to make it water resistant without losing its breathability. In researching this, I also came across Kip leather as opposed to Greasy or oily Kip leather. And apparently Kip leather is from young animals and produces softer hides used particularly for gloves. Potentially very confusing as are many things to do with leather. This construction uses a single piece of leather moulded around the boot last and sewn with one stitch at the back of the boot. This Greasy Kip leather feels greasy to the touch, but it's not of course because the oils are in the leather rather than sitting on top. I've recently conditioned these boots, more of that later, and already the conditioner has been really absorbed deep into the leather. It feels very soft and supple for a work boot, but I can attest to how tough it really is. The one piece upper construction is so simple that that is almost all I have to say about it. Built around a gently rounded toe, it's a very elegant design. The elastic goring panels are made a very resistant elastic. I'm sometimes surprised that reviews of these boots don't say much about how this elastic is resistant to being pulled out of shape. In my experience with Chelsea boots, many are made with poorer quality elastic goring, and over a surprisingly short time, these side panels become loose and flabby, not these. As usual, there are two pull tabs. They help you pull the collar apart when you slip your feet in. I find this is more effective than struggling with a single pull tab as you try to slip your feet in and having to flex your ankles to do so. Inside, unlike the craftsman, the boots are not lined in the back, but they have a natural colored leather lining across the top of the instet and up the front of the shaft. The back of the shaft is also lined, but with a dark colored and stiffer leather. Staying inside, there is an internal composite heel counter to give the heel structure and to support your heel and the boot, and it's covered by that leather lining in the shaft. The toe box is also structured with a composite toe stiffener, and it's covered on the inside with what feels like a suede cover. Before I keep going on inside the boot, I need to explain the good year-welted form of construction that connects the upper and insole construct with the outsole construct. So in good year-welting, a strip of leather called the welt is sewn to the uppers on the inside of the boot. The outside edge of the welt is sewn to the outsole construct with a stitch on the outside edge of the welt. This is the stitching you can see on top of the ledge formed by the welt and underneath going around the sole in this groove channel. Good year-welting is more water resistant because no stitches go all the way through from the outside of the sole directly into the inside of the boot. The welt forms the barrier. At the same time, good year-welting is also more easy to re-sole or re-craft. All you do is remove the stitches, replace the worn sole, and re-stitch the new one to the welt all without touching the uppers leather. Now, seeing as the welt itself is about two mils thick and it's sewn on top of the turned-in uppers leather, which is also about two mils thick, you can see that this causes the welt to form like a little damn wall around the edge of the boot, therefore causing a cavity on the inside. In these boots, that cavity is filled with a cork filler and in that layer of cork is embedded a fiberglass shank or a strip of fiberglass running from the heel to the foot pad that gives arch support in this gap here and torsional stability as well. Covering up that cork filler on the inside is a thick leather insole. This combination of leather and cork is said to be more comfortable over time because your weight impresses the shape of your feet into the boots, making it mold to your exact foot shape. Then, just under the heel is another pad of leather that provides shock absorption as well as protects against the clinch nails used to attach the heels, because this is a 270 degree Goodyear welter boot, meaning the welt goes three quarters of the way around the front of the boot, attaching the uppers to the sole across that arch. The sole and heel at the back of the foot is attached with glues and nails as well. The advantage of this is that it gives the back of the boot a sleek shape without a ledge of welt sticking out. The outsole that's stitched to the welt is a thick rubber outsole. I can't actually see a midsole, but the rubber is so thick as to be quite shock absorbing in itself. It's really very comfortable. The sole is branded Longhorn brand oil resistant sole. It's an Aaron Williams brand. It has these V bar treads as lugs. They run along the inside of the foot pad and are cut quite deep, but they don't really pick up any sand or gravel or mud. Or if they do, you can easily knock them and stamp them off. The heel block is a couple of layers of solid rubber and pretty effective in absorbing shock as you walk over any kind of terrain or flooring. Overall, the quality control is nothing short of excellent. The stitching up that back seam, the stitching around the gore ring, nothing short of perfect, no loose threads, perfect stitch per inch consistency, and these are handmade boots. The stitching around the welt is so precise and beautifully tucked in almost under the curve of the uppers so that you can hardly see that welt. With some other welted boots, the welt sticks out like a whole centimeter. The leather for the uppers is chosen well during the clicking process and shows no loose grain and hardly any creasing. Okay, let's take a look at how to take care of this leather. I've said before in my other videos, my first port of call looking for care products is the manufacturer. In this case, RM Williams gives a lot of information about caring for this greasy kit leather. The process that they recommend is, it's pretty standard. First you remove mud, dirt, dust, or salt with a brush and then a damp cloth. This is important. The single most destructive factor on leather is the accumulation of microscopic grit mixed up with waxy conditioners that over time grind and cut into the surface of the leather like fine sandpaper. Do not condition even just dusty boots without cleaning them first. Second, they recommend applying their leather cleaner which cleans the greasier marks on the leather and then remove any excess cleaner with a damp cloth. To condition the leather after cleaning, they recommend using RM Williams's leather conditioner. Allow it to penetrate and be absorbed and then wipe off the excess. You can brush it after conditioning with the leather conditioner, but as a kit leather, it won't do much to shine it up. And the leather conditioner will have absorbed deep into the leather anyway and doesn't need to be brushed around. You can get either RM Williams's leather conditioner that has beeswax and lanolin or their saddle and leather dressing which contains a little neat foot oil. To be honest, although the saddle and leather dressing is a little more expensive, I find that in kit leathers and in say crazy horse and other distressed leathers, it penetrates a bit better and is better at waterproofing. I'll put a link to these products in the description below. Now to sizing. RM Williams uses UK sizing numbers. UK sizing number is one number down from US sizing number. So a US size eight is in fact a UK and therefore RM Williams size seven. RM Williams width sizing is G for average width. So a US average width D is in fact an RM Williams G width. And RM Williams H width is a US E and so on. So my UK Brannock size, what I consider my true size is a UK seven and a half in G width. That equates to a US eight and a half in D width. UK is one number down from US remember. US heritage style boot manufacturers usually run large. So in most of my US boots, I actually size a half down from my true to size and I buy a US eight in D width. However, RM Williams in fact, it seems to me like most European boots run true to size. So I should wear a UK seven and a half G or equating to a US eight and a half D. But RM Williams' last up pretty slim in my opinion, at least for my feet, a seven and a half is just a little short of my liking, but importantly, is quite tight for me around my little toes. So in RM's boots, I take a UK eight G that's a US nine D or a half size up from my true to size. This gives me a comfortable snug fit around the heel, the waist and the ball of the foot. And it gives me room around the toes and gives me that thumbs width measure in the front. In this size, the heels, the arch, the waist and the instep all hug my feet and ankle so that the Chelsea boot is secure around my foot and doesn't slop around when I walk. And in this size, it's perfectly comfortable out of the box. In fact, I didn't quite think that a half size up would be comfy. And I argued with a rather snooty lady in the RM Williams shop, selling all your products at about $600. They tend to be snooty at people who they don't think should be able to afford their boots. However, when I put them on, I had to eat my words. The leather is soft yet tough. The sole is flexible from the get go. So I didn't experience any breaking problems at all in this size. In the time I've had these, they've truly become even more comfortable as both the insoles and the leather has formed to my feet. I have traveled in these. I've flown three or four hours at a time. I've driven several hundred Ks at a time, stood all day in them. And yes, I have used them in the garden and they've never been anything but comfortable. Now let's take a look at price and value. These gardener boots cost Aussie $595. The luxury model with Chrome XL and Avibam Commando Lug Soul are 695 Aussie. What do these compare with? Amongst Australian made boots, and yes, these are still made in South Australia, there's no comparison really. You can't compare them with other Aussie-made work boots like Redbacks because those are TPU soles, firmly molded on, not good year-welded with leather insoles and cork filling. So we have to compare them with imports. Redwing Classic Chelsea work boots on a wage sole can be bought here for just under 500 Aussie. Subject to availability, you can buy other Redwing Chelsea work boots, the 2918 with the half commander sole for example, or the 8201 Rancher Chelsea for around $300 to $500, depending on if they are on sale. And you have to say, those Redwing models are probably not as versatile or as well made as these anytime, anywhere casual boots. So no real comparison. Excellent quality control, great materials, very comfortable and proven to be tough and quite, quite versatile in what you wear them with giving you more value per wear. The good year-welded construction means that you'll have them pretty much forever, making cost per wear very light. So overall, probably worth every penny. You'd think so, but I personally have to wonder how much of the markup on cost is attributed to the brand name and luxury status of RM Williams boots. Their retail price took a jump when Louis Vuitton took them over. Did manufacturing costs and overheads increase suddenly overnight? I don't know, I love these boots, but you be the judge. There you have it, the RM Williams Gardener Chelsea boot. I hope you liked the review and I'd love to hear what you think in the comments below. And if you liked the review, don't forget to click on the like button below and if you don't want to miss the other reviews, boot unboxings and brand comparisons that I intend to upload, click on the subscribe button below as well. Until then, take care and I'll see you soon.