Fashion

Shoes, shoes, shoes. Tonight I'm looking for dress shoes.

On Valentine's Day Dawn and I visited the Arden Fair Mall and looked at rubies and amethyst for her and dress shoes for me. I found several brands at Macy's that had the look I liked:

• Alfani Lexington (Macy's/Bloomingdale's house brand)
  
• Kenneth Cole Reaction T-Flex
• Bostonian Tahoe and Akron
• Rockport (I wrote down capital and shareholder but I can't find a link)

I'm a smart guy, so when it comes to shoes I think, ok, I'll look it up on the intertubes and find out better prices and brands, and make an informed decision.

My first stop was a Forbes article listing the world's top shoe companies and conversations with image consultants suggesting good pairs of high-end dress shoes start at $350. This is (in their judgment) the cream of the crop: New & Lingwood, Crockett & Jones, J.M. Weston, Jeffery West, John Lobb, Tanino Crisci, Edward Green, and Alden.

Things I learned:

• Most high-end dress shoe lines seem to come from Britain, Italy, or America
• J.M. Weston's web site includes a video on polishing and glazing shoe leather
• Don't buy brown shoes, instead buy oxblood (charming, isn't it?), burgundy, cognac, or honey colors. As the Frank Zappa song goes, "Brown shoes don't make it."

I also learned from price-comparisons on the internet that the prices for brands at Macy's seemed competitive (+/- $10).

Fashion 4 Nerds suggests shoes from Aldo.

I learned from Wikipedia that three general categories of shoes exist:

1. Balmorals (laces hold together slit in upper)
   
2. Blüchers (laces hold together leather flaps attached to upper)
   
3. Monk-straps (buckle/strap instead of laces)

There are also three types of tips to dress shoes:

1. Plain-toes (no cap)
   
2. Cap-toes (extra layer that caps the toe area)
   
3. Wing-tips (extra layer that caps the toe area and extends along sides of shoes)

Zappos.com seems to house an extensive collection. These people from Wisconsin suggest Allen Edmonds.

My last stop this evening was the Style Forum, where they post pictures of colors of various shoe lines, including several from above.