 Hi there, how are you going? Welcome. For those of you new here, my name is Tech and this is my channel Boot Lossophy in which I talk about boots, their makers and other related boot stuff. In this video, I'm reviewing the Parkhurst brand Spaulding Boot in Natural Chromic Cell. This is the Parkhurst brand Spaulding Boot in Natural Chromic Cell. This model is no longer available sadly because it's one of the most beautiful boots I own. Nevertheless, I'm bringing you this review to you so that you can get to know the work of the maker Parkhurst as well as a style of the boot called a Brogue Wingtip Boot or originally a Country Boot. I'd also like to introduce this Chromic Cell leather to you. Parkhurst calls this design the Spaulding. Parkhurst was started in 2018 by founder Andrew Savisco. I've introduced the company in detail before in some of my other reviews so if you want to know more you can check out these reviews that should pop up here and I'll leave a link to the story of the Parkhurst brand in the description below. As you can see, it's a Brogue Wingtip Boot with an Oxford closed lacing system. A Brogue Boot is so-called because of the Broging, the decorative punch detailing along the edges and seams of the leather pieces. The holes actually had a practical purpose. Brogues were originally outdoor Country Boots and Shoes made of a sturdy leather invented in either Ireland or Scotland depending on who you speak to. They were worn outdoors over marshy boggy ground and the perforations were introduced to allow the uppers to let the water out and dry more quickly. Later they were adopted by English gentlemen, wasn't everything, and worn by them when they retired to their country houses at the weekend for a spot of shooting and hunting. Even later when the gentile divide between formal and informal war away, they became another fashionable design in boots and shoes in the city. They come in a variety of these designs and these are known as full brogues or wingtips. Full brogues or wingtips, the name is interchangeable, characterized by toe cap that extends down the sides hence wings and in some cases such as these, had extra panels echoing that wing and a medallion toe cap, a toe cap that had the decorative brogue holes punched in pattern in there. In most cases the edges of the leather panels would be pink giving these iconic serrated edges. Brogues had both Oxford and Derby closing styles. A Derby closing style has open panels, the panels are sewn onto the outside of the van, whereas the Oxford style like these are closed in that the two sides of the lacing panels meet down here, sewn under the van and you can't get your finger underneath them to open them up. You can see the difference of a Derby style on the Thursday wingtip boot, see my review up here. In the US, the Derby closing style, they pronounce it Derby, is also called a Blucher, after Marshall Blucher of rescuing Wellington at Waterloo fan, who shot his army with easy on and off boots with the open lacing system. Anyway, digression. This Oxford style is considered more formal and so formal brogues will tend to have closed Oxford lacing. This is where these are a conflict of ideas because while looking like a formal brogue wingtip boot, of course it's made in natural chrome excel, which is a wildly informal leather. Chrome excel is a leather made by Horween Tannery based in Chicago in the US. Horween is a five generation owned and operated family company, one of the oldest continuously running Tanneries in the US. Amongst the many high quality leathers that they tan, chrome excel is arguably their most famous, along with perhaps their shell cordovan. There are a lot of stories about chrome excel and one of them is that Horween developed chrome excel in the early 20th century, when the invention of safety razors meant that the use of shell cordovan for razor straps declined. They needed a replacement product and developed chrome excel for mechanical uses at first as engine seals. Its development coincided with World War I when industrial production of heavy trucks and tanks ramped up and so the leather became very popular in that use. Apparently a leather seal is better than rubber because it breaks down more slowly during heavy use. What made it really valuable as a seal or gasket was the heavy impregnation of oils and waxes during tanning. It's a slightly corrected full grain leather, combination tan based on tanning using chromium salts and then retan using vegetable tannins. It's finished in the tanning process by hot stuffing the leather with a formula of oils and waxes to imbue that oily waxy feel to it. This gives it the characteristics of being heat resistant and having a stronger tensile strength along with the ability to mould to a shape and breathe and for as boot fans the ability to develop a beautiful patina. Now I said slightly corrected full grain leather just now. Better explain that. Full grain leather is arguably the best type of leather. One thing about the leather industry is that there is no correct way of calling different grades of leather. For example, genuine leather which sounds terribly good is often the worst leather called genuine because it is leather. But that's about it, often made from poor quality leather splits. Look I'll do a video about different types of leather one day. Let me know if that's of interest to you by putting a comment below. But for now, just focusing on what's usually called full grain leather. It's pretty much all of the leather from the flesh side with the loose fibres showing all nappy to the full grain or hair side with just the hair removed and still showing all the animals wrinkles, hair holes, veins and scars, the so called grain. Top grain leather is the same but the top of the skin is slightly sanded to remove the wrinkles, hair holes, veins and scars. Chromic cell is likely sanded to smooth it but it still shows the character of the animals life. Because of all this hot stuffed oils and waxes it's also a pull up leather. You can pull up against the leather and the colour will move around as the oils and waxes move around under the surface. As a really oil stuffed leather it can scuff quite easily but it repairs itself quite easily. All you have to do often is just rub it with a finger and as you heat the leather in that way the oils and waxes move back and cover up the scuff. Halloween produces chromic cell in a pretty big variety of colours but they all tend to be brown or black based earth tone colours. I think this is due to the heavy waxes and oils used. I can't find any other reason for that. In this case it's a natural chromic cell or undyed chromic cell. When it comes out of the box it's a light sand coloured brown. You can also see what it looked like on a pair of Oak Street boot makers trench boots when I unboxed those by clicking on the link above. In fact when it first appears it's very even and light tan. To many first time boot buyers they're horrified to learn that it will darken with use. As you can see these are now 9 or 10 months old. They have developed a deep patina with use becoming almost a dark burnt honey colour. Kind of mid brown with patches of light and dark but still light enough for the grain to show through. As a natural leather it darkens with conditioners so I've been very sparing and it actually tans if you leave it in the sun like skin. This pair have also seen the polish of my trousers on the shaft turning it a deep colour there. The act of just brushing a lot my arm fell off also deepens that shade and builds the patina. As a boot leather it is incredibly complex and interesting to see as it develops over time. I said that I'd been sparing and conditioning this. I waited about 4 or 5 months before it saw the first drop of conditioner. I wanted the tan and patina to develop naturally before I conditioned it. Being such a light colour to start with I was concerned that conditioning this boot that early would unnaturally darken the leather. So I waited I think about 5 months at the end with some regular but not heavy wear. I used neutral coloured Venetian shoe cream. Really I don't think you can go wrong with VSC on smooth leathers. Especially as Horween uses litres of the stuff when they finish the chrome XL hides. It did soak in quickly but didn't significantly darken it because it had already started developing this mid brown patina. What it did do though was to add a depth to the colour bringing out the dark and light play of shades. In future my thoughts are just to brush them regularly after every wear if I can be bothered. But certainly after every 2 or 3 wears at a time maybe once a week. The brushing vigorous brushing each time not only cleans the dust off it which can cause the leather to scratch and crack in time. But it also helps to distribute the oils and waxes and hence develop that patina further. You cannot believe the depth of colour that vigorous brushing brought to this. I might aim to condition them maybe twice a year now because they've been regularly worn and I don't want to dry out with sweat and moisture. Or when you use shoe trees they will help to dry out a damp just worn boot and they will help to prevent the ugly creasing on the vent. I'll put a link to the VSC and some shoe trees that I use in the description box below. Let's turn to how these are constructed. These are built on Parkhurst's old number 18 last. A last is the foot shaped 3D mould that the boot maker stretches the leather over to make the shape of the boot. That's why a red wing iron ranger looks different from this and why the new Parkhurst Allens in their 602 last even look different from these. Different lasts equals different shapes. The 18 last has quite a snug heel pocket, a narrow waist, a slim but roomy ball of the foot with reasonable volume and then rounded into a sleek almond shaped toe. The uppers are mainly made of 5 different panels not counting the tongue, each except the backstay brogued and pinked. Parkhurst said that this sporting boot took twice as long to stitch and used one and a half times more leather than one of their cap toe boots. You can see that the making will have to be much more precise, get one stitch wrong and the lines look all wrong. There is a single backstay that covers the stitching of the shaft, the heel counter, that stiff piece of material that shapes the heel. In this case I think it's elastic, it's quite thin in this case and it's placed on the inside under the lining. It is protected by the lining, I'm not sure if the toe is structured. If it is it's a very light touch because you can press it down quite easily. The inside is fully lined with soft veg tan leather and the insole and heel to arch cushioning is also leather. The uppers are attached to the sole construct using Goodyear Well construction. If you've seen enough of my videos you know what that is and you can watch the video up here to get the full gen. But basically a welt goes all the way around the edge of the shoe sewn to the uppers on the inside and the outside edge is sewn to the sole as you can see by the stitching here and here. In this case as with both Parker's boots it's a veg tan split reverse welt. The outside inner edge of the welt is flanged up against the uppers and so provides more water resistance. The advantage of Goodyear Well construction, many consider this the gold standard, is that it's water resistant and that it's easily re-solable when your soles become worn. As I said at the beginning it's a closed Oxford lacing system with four eyelets and three speed hooks. The back of the hardware are pressed with no washer backing. This is the only Parker's boot I know of that's fully leather lined, even the tongue which helps to stiffen the tongue and despite it not being gusseted helps prevent the tongue slipping to one side as you wear it through the day. Because of the construction I can't measure the thickness of the leather but the leather and lining combined is about three millimetres, not particularly thick but does make for a softer and more supple boot and contributes to it weighing about 680 grams per boot, not heavy. That's about dressed boot weight which I guess is what this is despite the natty CXL or natural chrome XL looking so casual. The midsole is veg tan leather and there is a real leather stacked heel sandwiched by the outsole rubber and the heel top lift rubber. The outsole and heel top lift are from Daynight. Daynight is from a company in the UK that was started at the turn of the 20th century. The Daynight pattern invented in 1910 and called Daynight because the factory used to run day and night. It's a very popular rubber outsole. I think every boot manufacturer uses it in one of their models or they make a proprietary version of the Daynight outsole. Thursday and Grant Stone come to mind. The secret to the popularity is the way Daynight combines grippiness with a reasonably thin profile so that you can use it for reasonably dressy boots as well as boots that might need grip outdoors. The studs are low profile and the way they are recessed into these shallow depressions provide grip without picking up loose dirt and gravel. I find Daynight very good for my use case scenarios, mainly urban but with an occasional tour of walking on forest trails and I haven't slipped yet. The Daynight outsole helps make these a pretty comfortable boot. The old 18 last snugly holds your foot and gives pretty good arch support. I think because of the way the arch area tucks in under your arch. The heel inlay also provides some arch support as does the fiberglass shack inserted in the cork mid layer between the leather midsole and the leather insole. After these 9 or 10 months use the layers of real leather and cork under my foot along with the rubber outsole have compressed to the shape of my feet so that they feel almost custom made for me. The shock absorption as I walk is pretty good. I took a half size down from my true Brannock size in these as was recommended. So these are a size 8. Parkhurst's last run between D and E width from the heel to the ball of the foot and that fit me really well. Just for size comparisons I take an 8D in Red Wing Iron Rangers Red Wing Moctose and Blacksmiths. I take an 8D in Grant Stone's Leo and Floyd Lasts. I take an 8D in Alden Indies and in Wolverine 1000 miles and I also take a size 8 in Thursday boots. My added ass runners are a size 9. My Brannock size, that's the machine you stand on in a shoe store is an 8.5D. Fit it well and with it's chrome excel leather and I think really excellent sole construction. I had no breaking at all. This fitted and was comfortable straight out of the box. It's not a difficult boot to pair with clothes. It's a casual boot and I wouldn't wear it with a suit but it can be worn smart casual and business casual. I have worn it with a nice pair of chinos or with brown five pocket pants and a nice button up shirt. I have paired it with a non matching pair of pants and blazer and a waistcoat or a vest. The classic khaki chinos and blue blazers work really well with this. I don't often wear them with denim but it will work. I just think that the design is slightly above denim casual but I stress it will work. When I bought these in what I think September 2021 now they cost US $380. I mean that's a really good price for these well made boots. In terms of quality for that price gosh I get a difficult to make boot made well I get chrome excel I get a comfortable boot I get a well designed last that suits my feet. Yeah there were some loose threads a couple of months in but I singed them off and no problems. Good value at that price I think. If they do ever come back be prepared to pay I think high three hundreds or even low four hundreds such as what COVID has done to supply and manufacturing costs. So that's it guys. I hope you enjoyed my review of these parkhurst sporting boots in Natty CXL. It really is a shame that they're now unavailable. If you like the style though take a look at my review of the Thursday wingtip boot. Different leather and color but similar broke wingtip design. I'll put a link to that review in the description below. Okay so now do me a favor and like and subscribe by clicking on those buttons below. It will really help me to grow my channel. Anyway time to go. You guys take care and I'll see you again soon.