 G'day, how are you going? Welcome to Boot Lossophy, and if you're new here, my name is Tech. I acknowledge the traditional custodians of the lands that I live and work on, the Wajik people of Nungabuja. Now in this video, I'm looking at the Helm Zind Boot after I've kicked them around for the last five months. This is the Zind Boot from Helm, based out of Austin, Texas, in the United States. I need to say that this boot was given to me for review in October 2022, but there were no terms made about how I should review these boots and what I had to say. So as in my unboxing video up here, you're going to get my honest opinion of these boots. I think this was once the most popular boot, but may have been overtaken recently by their more work boot-style Hollis boot. This is called the Zind, after one of Helm's employees, Amelia Zind. Helm named all their boots after employees or after people connected to the business, which I think is a really nice touch in corporate culture and branding. This Zind Boot is made in a sleek design that's much more dress boot design than service boot or work boot. It's a little over five inches tall at the shaft from the top of the heel, and while it has a rugged looking pull tab, it has an all-islet derby or derby lacing system, a low profile and sleek almond shaped toe box, and an interesting low profile part leather, part rubber sole. All this combined makes this look like a dress issue that you might even want to wear with a suit rather than an all-purpose service boot that you'd wear casually or in the yard. I think there are enough formal elements in it, especially today where suits are not as buttoned up and formal as just a few years ago. I think there's enough formal elements to wear this with a suit. Your suit trousers will cover up the shaft anyway and the pull tab as well, and to most it's going to look like a dress shoe. However, there are also enough interesting elements like the natural leather coloured welt and the natural colour in the heel, and Helm's sometimes annoying, sometimes attractive white midsole stripe that does allow you to wear it with some smart casual outfits that lean towards business offices. You can pair these with khaki or darker neutral coloured chinos or pants, casual button down shirts and a blazer. You can also wear it with dark and clean jeans, nothing too faded or torn or lumberjacky, as well as some casual Henleys and jackets. Overall, it is reasonably versatile within a narrow range of smart casual to dressy outfits. It's not quite as versatile I think in a one-boot wardrobe like a Thursday captain where you can polish it up and wear it business casual or rough it up and wear it with faded jeans and t-shirt. But before we go on, let's take a look at Helm. Helm, or I think more correctly Helm boots, was started in 2009 by founder, CEO and designer, Joshua Bingerman. Mr. Bingerman is an American with about 20 years in the shoe industry before he started Helm. He first started manufacturing his boots in Turkey, but apparently got sick of customs and other regulations importing them back to the US so that he moved his operations to Austin and Texas, but makes his boots in Maine. If it's important to you, his website explains that they now manufacture in Maine, Arkansas and Brazil. The materials they use come from all over the place. Their upper leathers, for example, may come from Horween and Seidel, two famous American Tanries, as well as from Tanries in Brazil and the Dominican Republic. Now today, they make this zin style, two other styles of six inch boots, a couple of chakkas, a choce boot and a side zip boot, as well as a couple of styles of shoes, low and high top sneakers and even slippers. So quite a lot of styles which may surprise you. I know that I'd always thought of them as a boot company. I mean, after all, it's in the name. But you should take a look at their website and probably be as surprised as I was. I'll leave a link in the description box below. A couple of things I like about the company. They openly state so that you can judge how they do it, that they pursue quality and endurance in their products. They provide a 20% discount to the military and military families, I'm guessing US military, as well as the first responders and even government employees and teachers. Now I think that's pretty cool. And they also have a MyCrew program, which is basically a frequent flyer program where you accrue points for buying and for referring to friends, which you can then trade in for discounts or to pay for your boots. Now as a management consultant who's written a book on small business marketing, I approve. Shameless plug. The book is called Smart Marketing and you can get it on Amazon. I'll leave a link below if you're interested. Taking a look at how the helm's in is constructed, I'll do the usual and start at the bottom and work my way up. I mentioned this interesting half leather part rubber sole. I've never seen anything quite like this before. It starts with a two layer, veg tan leather, full length outsole that combines to be about 7mm thick. Under the ball of the foot, the outermost layer of leather is cut out and a rubber 4mm thick patch sole is inserted. It's only at the ball of the foot though. As you can see, the tip of the toe goes back to being leather. Many people like leather soles for their flexibility and breathability because despite all the glue and so on, it's still more breathable than just rubber. Others dislike leather soles intensely because of the lack of grip and the ugly wear that you can get on it. So this is a very clever combination of leather and rubber to give you the best of both worlds. I'll tell you a secret though. I'm not completely sold on it, pardon the pun. This little leather tip is quite tricky before it roughs up and even now after it's been roughed up. When I wear leather sole boots, I know I'm wearing leather sole boots. I take care. I walk purposefully. These give me a false sense of security because walking on smooth or slippery surfaces, you get the grip of the rubber and then you push off the toe when you walk and it slips. These make me walk funny. But moving past that personal observation, the heel stack I think is leather. It's hard to tell and it could be leatherboard but the edge of it looks like leather fibres. On top of the heel is a leather top lift with a rubber piece mitered into the corner for grip. At the midsole is a white rubber midsole. Now this is Helm's signature white rubber midsole that you see on all of their boots. You can visually recognize a Helm boot quite quickly from that white line. I like it but others don't. Now to me, if you're going to use a rubber midsole which many bootmakers do, don't sort of mark them down for it, you use them for comfort and maybe cost. Well then you might as well make a trademark out of it. It's unique branding. Now the way the uppers are connected to the sole is by the black rapid stitch welter form of construction. You can see my video of the four main types of boot construction up here. But briefly, the upper is lasted and an insole is inserted. Then a midsole is glued on first and then stitched through the uppers, insole and midsole on the inside. An outsole is then glued onto the midsole covering up the black stitch and then rapid stitch through the midsole and the outsole. I think in this case a welt is introduced around the boot and above the rubber midsole before the rapid stitch is applied and that's what gives us this leather welter look. Blake rapid stitch is more water resistant than just plain Blake stitching because of the use of the midsole where in Blake stitching the midsole is basically the outsole and the stitches go all the way through everything at once. I imagine the use of a welt just improves that. Neither Blake stitching nor Blake rapid stitching is meant to be easily resealable but my cobblest disagrees. This construction should make the boot lighter but in the ZIN, I think the introduction of a leather welt might negate that. It doesn't feel like a particularly light flimsy makeup. It weighs about 900 grams or two pounds which is about average for boots in this style. Inside the boot is a filler to fill the cavity caused by the thickness of the uppers and the welt around the insole. Their website does not say what that filler is so I'm going to assume it's not cork. There is a shank and again they don't say what it is but because of the weight I'm going to guess that it's probably composite or fibreglass something like that. Staying inside there's a leather and foam back comfort sock liner that runs the full length of the boot. The foam is actually quite plush and it really feels soft and comfortable. Another notable point. At the heel, I just don't know if you're going to see this they print a seasonal quote like naming their boots after their business family members this is another nice touch. They say all truly great thoughts are conceived while walking. By the time you get yours it will say something different. Still inside the uppers are fully leather lined with a matching black I think it's lamb skin leather. It's really soft and comfortable even against a thin sock. Now to the uppers. Each color of the zin may be made in leather from different tannries but this black leather is Balthazar leather from B Leather tannery in the Dominican Republic. Now I don't know much about B Leather but they seem to be a family tannery that's been around since 1940. Their processes seem to be as environmentally protective as possible and they run corporate social responsibility programs so pretty good. Balthazar leather is their full grain wax leather. It is hot stuffed in that they push waxes and oils into the leather so that it retains some self-curing attributes and remains oily and supple. It is veg tann though not combination tann so if you're thinking of chrome excel it isn't. It's less oily to the touch more I don't know how to describe it more rubbery to the touch rather than soft and supple I don't mean that in a bad way but I'm not a fan of this leather don't get me wrong I think it's good quality I can see the full grain it's over 2mm thick and so far it's been durable and resistant to nicks and scratches in my everyday wear it's actually feel supple but it feels supportive but you know I'm not going to push my face into it and smell it like chrome excel the pattern is pretty simple one vamp piece, two quarters and a single back strip that falls into the pool loop the toes are lightly structured and there's an internal heel counter covered inside by the lining and kept in the pocket by the stitching in the outsole to me they feel like celastic composite I can't fault the clicking cutting or stitching everything is in place and for a handmade boot yes I know there are sewing machines involved for a hand guided boot the construction is very neat and all aligned the edge of the collar and the lace facings are cut leather, they're not rolled and the tongue is gusseted up to the third eyelet another nice touch so it helps with water and dirt and tongue doesn't slip around now talking eyelets there are seven antique brass eyelets and no speed hooks I don't mind the lack of speed hooks necessarily and they do reinforce that kind of dressy look but getting them laced up quickly is not a thing now overall the materials used and the construction processes and the quality control are pretty good as for leather care I treat them as dress boots except that in my five months experience I haven't really been able to put a good shine on these boots but start at the beginning now definitely my rule number one brush them regularly to keep them dirt and dust free use a fine horsehair brush to not only remove dirt and dust but also to warm up the leather and to help move the waxes around on the inside when they do need conditioning B Leather recommends black rock, leather and rich now I've never tried that and I used Venetian shoe cream on this with I think good effect as I said it doesn't take a shine though and I've used a smear of both neutral and black wax polish and while it cleans it up it really comes out as a sheen rather than a shine being black boots if when you first get them you feel the leather is a bit difficult to break in which it might be you can use a mink oil on them to soften them being black you're not going to really darken them and that's a clue as to breaking I did find the new leather quite tough they didn't bend and flex quickly in the shaft and the collar cut into my ankles the outside of the balls of my feet were not very supple at the beginning and I didn't feel that they stretched as easily as say chromic cell so breaking was hard not brutal, no blisters but it was hard funny because that was around the uppers underfoot the comfort was immediate anyway after 5 months the collar is still stiff but the uppers have become quite comfortable some people will hate all the rubber and foam in the sole rather than the traditional leather and cork but I honestly don't mind these are comfortable underfoot and so far they haven't broken down or anything as for sizing their website for the size says they are true to size I don't agree my true size on a brand new device is a US 8.5 in D width these are US 8 in standard width and they fit me very well the slimmed almond toe box did present some problems in being too snug for my little toes at the beginning but if I'd taken a larger size I think I would be tripping over my toes because they're quite long and get in the way if they were too big Helm's website does give you a pretty cool fit predictor where you enter a common boot brand and size that you wear and it works out what size you should order in using my Thursday captain and my red wing iron ranger sizes I was recommended an 8D in the ZIN so half down from true and not really true to size as I said at the start I was given these boots for a review on the website as at recording this they are listed at US $295 so they fall into that lower than mid range 300 to 400 category they compare in price to a Thursday president at $200 and a Thursday made in USA vanguard with Halloween leathers at $265 Thursday even at those prices or probably because of those prices can be a bit hit and miss in their QC I think red wing iron rangers totally different style I know are still at around $300 but they make a gazillion a year so they get cheaper per unit manufactured new entrant Caswell boots sell for over 300 with their interesting and more renowned Halloween stead and Seidel leathers so they do compare in good company based on that competition and the quality I think they are pretty good value at $295 not much more though just good value would I buy them if I hadn't been given them straight answer no but not because I think they're poor quality or that they are poor value at the price no my answer is based on my own style and aesthetics preferences I tend to like a clearer participant in the service boot world for my casual boots these don't do it for me aesthetically because they're too clean if you get what I mean if I do dress up particularly in a suit and I look for a black or a dark boot I wear my R.M. Williams black yearling craftsman or my Thursday dark oak wing tips those appeal to my dress sense form growing up in the late 70s and the 80s where you wore suits and 3P suits at that if you like their aesthetic and by the way Nick at Stridewise clearly does because he calls these black zines his favourite and most versatile black boots but if you like their style at that quality and at that price you should take a look at them the link is in the description below in summary the Helms Inn is a sleek dressy boot with some quirky brand features like the white midsole stripe and the half leather part rubber outsole they are made well and will appeal to those looking for a dressier boot on the con side I'm not a fan of the Balthasar leather and I did find them difficult to break in and that leather toe tip in the sole is annoying when I walk now you know what to do if you're still here click on the like and the subscribe buttons and help me grow my channel I have a new quarters worth of ideas for boots and boot related videos coming up over the next 3 months so you don't want to miss them click on subscribe and then take care and until next time I'll see you soon