Parkhurst Allen Boot in Spruce Kudu - The Ultimate Green Boot
Jul 25, 2023
Parkhurst Brand is one of the most innovative boot makers that use unique leathers in their service boot designs.
This is the Parkhurst Allen boot in the makeup they call Spruce Kudu - click on the image to view my YouTube review.
I've had these boots for over two years now, bought in June 2021, worn regularly but not hard.
Parkhurst is a direct-to-consumer brand selling directly from their website to cut out the extra margin from a wholesaler and so the company is able to keep their boots in the US$350 to USD$450
range.
Parkhurst is really a one-man band.
The founder, Andrew Svisco, started the company in 2018 when he saw a market niche for well-made heritage-style boots that were updated in their aesthetics and kept in an affordable price range.
The 2010s saw several new boot manufacturers take the idea of the early 20th-century work boot or military-style service boot, made using old-time construction methods, but updated them to combine a more dressy combination aesthetic.
During that period, companies such as Thursday, Mark Albert (now sadly gone), Parkhurst, Grant Stone, Oak Street Bootmakers - all started with a similar outlook on what they wanted to produce.
Andrew's idea was also to celebrate the American boot-making industry, which was arguably starting to deteriorate and vanish as the bigger manufacturers started to take production out of the US for cost savings. Parkhurst is founded on trying to maintain the experience of generations
and trying to do its bit to maintain employment in the trade.
So to manufacture his boots, Andrew partnered with a well-established shoe factory in upstate New York, the former P W Minor factory. On top of that, the business model included sourcing as much raw material from the US as possible, and where this wasn't possible or where quality dictated an overseas supplier, he tried to buy through local distributors to try and keep the supply chain feeding American small businesses as much as possible.
From what I can see, Parkhurst did not raise capital through a Kickstarter campaign or through traditional capital raising. It started as and remains a small company, and as such, cannot order huge amounts of material from tanneries and so operates as a small-batch manufacturer. This means that Parkhurst makes a few base models but then varies them with different uppers and soles in small batches until the leather runs out.
The COVID years really hit Parkhurst hard. Their local partners, including the P W Minor factory and the local suppliers, hit supply problems, staff shortages and business closures. At the end of the supply chain, Parkhurst struggled over 2021 and 2022 to obtain material and to make the boots, and it was not until late 2022 when Andrew partnered with a Spanish factory and tannery that he was able to consistently manufacture boots and bring out new styles.
This small-batch business model gives Parkhurst a cachet as a boutique manufacturer of unique, quality boots, but also gives Parkhurst a disadvantage in that once finished, a particular make-up of boots may not be produced again.
Recently, Andrew has been able to make some core models, based on waxed suede articles from a European tannery.
KUDU LEATHER
That's a roundabout way of telling you that this model of Parkhurst's Allen boot, in Spruce Kudu, is an on-again, off-again makeup. It was sold out in 2021 when I bought this pair, and was returned into stock in late 2022 but then sold out quickly. It is now back in stock as I write, but honestly, don't sleep on it and check out his website for availability.
This iteration of one of Parkhurst's stock designs, the Allen boot, is in kudu leather from the Charles F Stead tannery in the UK.
Kudu is a southern African antelope that run free-range. The hides are sourced sustainably. No animals are killed for their hide. The governments in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Namibia control the population of these animals, that otherwise harm crops and agriculture, by culling them from time to time.
The meat is distributed amongst the local population, and the hides - that would otherwise go to waste - are sold to tanneries around the world.
The animal is - as I said - free range. So, it lives in the savannah and gets scratched by thorns, hunted by predators, and accumulates a lot of marks and scars. This means that the skin develops a lot of character that shows on the boot, and no two pairs are exactly the same.
It's probably hard enough to try to match as closely as possible the parts of the hide that make up the left and the right boot of the same pair!
It's a mid to lightweight leather, supple yet tough, and some boot makers like Grant Stone will make a reverse version of kudu leather boots - they flip over the leather so that the flesh or nappy suede-like side is outside and the grain, hair side - is inside. Cool as that is, I think the grain side showing the life of the animal, is just irreplaceable.
Some bootmakers also lightly wax the leather. In this case, Parkhurst leaves the leather quite dry to the touch. This means it has a tactile feel to it that reinforces each whorl and scar and doesn't feel like there's a layer of wax that makes the surface smooth and without character.
Charles F Stead in Leeds, England, is a renowned tannery that makes the best suede and exotic leathers and this version of green-dyed kudu is from Stead. In this makeup, the rough and gnarly green kudu is made into Parkhurst's plain toe service boot, called the Allen.
It's a dressy-shaped 6-inch service boot. The profile is a sleek and low-volume design in the vamp and the toe box, and from the top, it's wide at the ball of the foot but then slims down toward the toe before it rounds off at the toe.
In many ways, this is the archetypical service boot but sleeked down to make a dressy design.
I say dressy design and the profile shows that - but clearly, this is a casual boot. I'm pretty sure nobody wears it with a suit - not even a green suit. The gnarly kudu leather, the fact that it's green, and edged by the tan split reverse welt - I'll talk about that when I talk about construction later- make it a casual boot.
Sure, I believe you can wear it dressy casual - not quite business casual, but with say Chinos and a dressy casual shirt like an Oxford Cloth Button Down.
Jeans? Yup, definitely, any denim will go with this, whether light denim, dark denim or selvedge and faded.
It will go with all kinds of Chinos and 5-pocket pants, and potentially even wool trousers. You can also dress it down up top with a T-shirt and layers or a flannel shirt and a leather or bomber jacket. You can wear it with pretty much any colour - except green.
Do not wear it with green, unless you are a Leprechaun.
It doesn't work.
I actually find the best combos for these boots are simple and unobtrusive colours - all black is my favourite when I pull out these boots, or greys or khaki and other brown shades. I think the key is to pull everything else back, and let the green pop on your feet.
Oh, and by the way - is the Spruce Kudu Allen boot only for hipsters and Instagram influencers?
No sir, as I'll go into the construction, I think these are strong enough to wear as hardy daily beater boots.
Not to build a house or anything, but if you're working in the yard or in the workshop - no problem at all if you don't mind bashing up this lovely green. Go check out Instagram for how @SkyBootGuy wears them in his workshop and how @classic.jase.65 abuses them in his yard.
CONSTRUCTION, BUILD QUALITY, QUALITY CONTROL
On that note, let's take a look at how these boots are put together.
Before I describe the construction, know that this pair was made in the New York contracted factory and while I understand the basic construction is the same, the current ones made in the Spanish factory may be slightly different.
In my opinion though, with several pairs of Parkhurst boots bought that were made by the New York factory, and several more bought after the move to Spain, I actually think the QC from the Spanish factory is more consistent and accurate.
The uppers panels are stitched together with a combination of double and triple-stitching, depending on where strength is required, and I guess with an eye to design aesthetics.
It's triple-stitched in a 2 plus 1 pattern in the lower quarter. At the two-piece backstay - a single panel up the back of the shaft and the heel cup - they are double-stitched. The quarters around the eyelets and at the collar are single stitched - where no great strength is required.
It has 7 eyelets, no speed hooks, and the hardware is painted brown, or olive green/brown.
The boots come with two pairs of round cotton laces, but I switched them up for green leather laces - I just think they add to the ruggedness of the green kudu.
Some people have a problem with all eyelets.
Yeah, it does cost some time when I take the boot off or put it on. I do have to tend to remove the bootlaces from the top eyelets when I take them off to get my feet out or to put them on again. Yes a small pain, but really, a first-world problem.
The tongue is semi-gusseted up to the third eyelet. I really find this great because ungusseted tongues don't agree with my right foot. Boots with ungusseted tongues tend to give me slipping tongue syndrome on my right foot - where the tongue slips to one side during wear.
There's a structured toe box. It has a little reinforcement, enough to keep the shape but soft to the press. These use Celastic in there. Celastic is a man-made thermoplastic that you can shape when it is warm before it hardens to a shape, and lots of bootmakers use it these days instead of leather.
Let's face it, it's cheaper and produces a more affordable boot.
There's the same Celastic in the heel counter under the backstay - it keeps the shape of the heel and gives your foot support around the heel.
Inside the uppers, the boot is lined with 2-ounce veg-tanned leather in the toe and vamp, but unlined up the shaft, and the tongue is unlined. That's actually a pretty heavy-weight leather for lining - most boots use lining leathers around 1 to 1 and a half ounces.
The uppers are built around Parkhurst's 602 Last.
A last is a foot-shaped mould that the boot maker shapes the uppers around to form the shape of the boot. You sew the panels of the uppers together, and then you wrap the floppy uppers around the last, tighten it to create the shape, then sew the soles on.
So, the boot brand's last is very important not only to create the aesthetic shape of the boot, but also for the comfort factor of how it fits your foot. I'll talk more about this 602 last when I talk about sizing and comfort.
The uppers are sewn onto the soles using the Goodyear Welted construction method.
A welt is a strip of leather that goes around the edge of the boot. Generally, the inside edge of the welt is sewn to the uppers and insole, and the outside edge is sewn through the midsole and the outsole together. In this case, it's a 360-degree Goodyear welt - it goes all the way around the boot, and it is technically a split reverse Goodyear welt.
The normal flat welt is split halfway through on the inside, and the bottom half of that split is sewn to the insole and uppers as normal, but then the upper half of that split is flanged back and pushed against the uppers on the outside.
A Goodyear welted shoe is resolable - a cobbler can just undo the stitches in the welt and sole and stitch on a new outsole without damaging the upper leather. And a Goodyear welted shoe is also reputedly more water resistant. The welt creates a barrier between the insoles and the outsole - so no stitch holes go straight through from the outsole to inside the boot, thus not allowing water to directly seep through.
In this case, a split reverse welt increases this water resistance - the flange upwards creates an extra barrier.
Let's go back inside the boot.
The insole is a 3-and-a-half to 4-millimetre vegetable tanned bends leather - leather from the tough back of the cow. On top of that, at the heel, is a heel pad and some foam to give you a bit of extra shock absorption in the heel strike.
Below the insole is a cork filling. If you think about it, when you put the thick leather welt around the outside edge of the shoe, it creates a bit of a cavity inside the welt. The cork layer fills this in so your feet don't feel the edge of the welt - which can obviously be uncomfortable - and provides more shock absorption.
For boot purists, this leather insole and cork filling is the gold standard of insole construction - leather and cork will compress with the pressure of your weight to create a shape that is unique to the lumps and bumps of your feet creating a customized feel over time.
Embedded in the cork layer is a fibreglass shank, running from the heel to the ball of the foot.
A shank is an ice cream stick-shaped piece of a firm material, usually steel, sometimes wood or hardened leather, but in this case fibreglass. It gives you arch support so that the pressure of your feet doesn't push the gap between the ball and the heel down, causing foot tiredness over the day. It also gives the boot extra rigidity especially torsion rigidity when you step over uneven rocks and sharp edges.
I like fibreglass shanks. They're as tough as steel shanks, don't break or rust and get you through airport security without a problem. I travel a lot for my work as a management consultant and I especially choose Parkhursts or my R M Williams with fibreglass shanks when I travel.
Moving further down the inside of the boot, apart from the bends leather insole, there's another veg-tanned bends leather midsole that you can see just below the wheeled welt.
Then the rubber outsole is glued on top of the midsole, and the stitch goes through the lot.
The heel is stacked leather with a rubber top lift for grip and shock absorption. In this case, the rubber outsole and top lift is from Dainite, a UK-based sole manufacturer. They are made with relatively low-profile studs.
Dainite is a very popular sole choice on many boots.
Some boot makers even make their own proprietary rubber soles that look exactly like this - I'm thinking Thursday and Grant Stone as prime examples.
Dainite is popular because of its low profile as well as its grip. The low profile means that it looks like a "normal" or even like a dress shoe, unlike aggressive commando lugs that look too outdoorsy.
The grip is pretty reasonable - at least for my use-case scenarios. I live in a climate that doesn't snow and there's no ice on the ground, so I can't talk to those surfaces. I'm mainly using my boots in an urban scenario, across cement, pavement, grass lawns, carpet and offices.
I have worn Dainite on walks in the bush - I hesitate to call it a hike - with no issues. As I said, reasonable grip for most cases.
LEATHERCARE
Now let's turn to how you might care for these boots.
First, I hope you brush your boots with a good quality horsehair brush - if not every time you wear them, then at least after every three or four wears. That's the first rule of boot care!
As for conditioning, you know boot collectors, boot nerds and boot heads love conditioning their boots, almost as soon as they get them. I have a huge collection of boot oils, boot creams, boot conditioners and boot polishes, and like many boot fans I love taking care of my boots and more often than not, have to tell myself to - LEAVE IT ALONE!
But at some stage, you probably are going to have to clean your boots and if they're really dry, you are going to have to condition the leather. As much as possible, my advice is to listen to the bootmaker, and if there's not enough information, then check out the tannery.
Parkhurst recommends that you use Smith's Leather Balm or any natural applicant or wax. Parkhurst also recommends a nubuck or waterproofing spray.
Several people on the Facebook Parkhurst enthusiast group say that they've tried the Smiths leather balm and found that it darkens the green kudu. Some of them recommend just Bick 4 if you don't want to darken the leather. In my opinion, it's actually quite difficult to choose what to use, but....this is my advice.
It's quite a dry leather.
As much as possible, like suede, I would leave it alone. It's not like you can feel that it's dry and needs conditioning - I mean, it feels dry anyway!
If you really had to clean it, again, I'd treat it like suede and use a suede eraser to remove spots and stains. If that doesn't work, I'd use a damp cloth to wipe it over - and also remove dust and mud if that's accumulated.
If that doesn't work, and it really needs cleaning, then and only then would I consider a gentle leather cleaner - not saddle soap, but something like Leather Honey Leather Cleaner - and follow the instructions! You can see links to some of these products in my Buy Stuff page.
If you really, really needed to condition the leather, then I'd try Bick 4, or I think I might prefer a suede conditioning spray like something from Timberland for their nubuck, or something from Ecco for their suede shoes, or ultimately a Saphir product called Renovateur Suede and Nubuck Spray.
Once cleaned and conditioned, you can waterproof it by using a Tarrago product called Nano Protector Spray.
If you don't mind darkening the leather or leaving a slightly waxy sheen to it, then, and only then would I experiment with balms like the Smiths.
But a word of warning - the look and texture will definitely change!
SIZING, FIT AND BREAK-IN
What about sizing and comfort?
Parkhurst's 602 last is the perfect last for my feet. They, and the Grant Stone Leo last as well as the Alden Trubalance last are anatomically perfect for my feet.
In all three, my heel is fitted snugly, the waist is hugged, then the lasts open out so that neither the ball of my feet, nor my toes, ever feel cramped.
My feet measure on the Brannock device as a US 8D.
The Brannock device is, if you don't already know, the aluminium device you stand on, and sliding levers then measure the length and width of your feet.
Most American boot manufacturers seem to run large and most will advise you to come down a half size from "True". Most of my American boots, from Red Wing to Thorogood, from Chippewa to Allen Edmonds, from Alden to Thursday are size 8.
I also take a size 8 in Parkhurst boots.
Parkhurst doesn't offer different widths. The Parkhurst 602 last is a combination last - primarily a D/E width. If you need wider widths, Andrew has told me recently that the modifications he made to the 602 last in the move to Spain have resulted in a better fit for people who initially thought the old 602 last were tight on their wide feet. I recommend that you contact Andrew by email - it's available on his website - giving him the different brands you wear and the sizes and widths you take.
You'll find Andrew extremely helpful and quick to respond.
In my size 8's, my Parkhursts are perfect for my 8 ½ D feet. As I've said before, the heel and waist around the arch are snug to hold the back half of my feet. The ball of my feet and my toes in this rounded toe box don't feel any pressure at all. My feet and ankles are fine, but if your feet are higher volume, it's possible your toes may start to feel the top of the vamp and toebox pressing on them.
For me, there was no break-in. The kudu leather is supple. Despite the double bends mid-soles, I found their flexibility quick to adapt to how I flexed my foot.
The arch support however was only ok but not great. I think I have average arches, perhaps even slightly flat. I found that I would have benefited from better arch support and I've actually put in one of those stick-down arch support wedges you can buy from a pharmacy.
When you order, you have the option of paying an extra $40 or so for extra arch support to be built in - if you feel you need to.
Overall, because of the last and the leather/cork/rubber combinations under your feet, shock absorption is pretty good. OK, I haven't gone for a run in these, but walking on hard floors like concrete, pavements and urban floor surfaces, my feet hold up well.
VALUE
Let's turn to the value of these Parkhurst boots.
All Parkhurst boots are currently in the US$ 350 to 450 range. These cost me $328 in June 2021 - which was about AU$ 420 at the time.
So, compared to cheap footwear like Ecco or local "High Street" fashion brands - not cheap. But take a look at R M Williams at AU$ 595 at that time.
Prices have gone up during the worst of COVID supply chain issues. These now list on the website at US$ 388 (18% increase) whereas RM Williams boots have gone up to AU$ 649 (also 18% increase).
In Australia, you can buy Red Wing Iron Rangers for AU$ 595, and Wolverine 1,000 Mile boots are about AU$ 600 depending on leather and colour. These are the quality comparisons you should make - all Goodyear welted, well-made boots with leathers from Horween and C F Stead among other well-known tanneries.
They compare pretty well in price.
As for value - that very subjective measure - let's tick through what you get:
- Goodyear welted construction - the gold standard if you like,
- Unique leather from renowned Charles F Stead tannery,
- Great last so great fit and comfort,
- Well-known Dainite sole,
- Solid leather and cork construction,
- Pretty good QC - no loose stitches, no badly sewn leather, no holes where they shouldn't be, nothing has fallen off after the last 2 years or so of steady wear.
I can't really think of any negatives except maybe that they're not particularly versatile - they are totally casual, and you do have to be careful what you wear them with if you don't want to look loud or like it's permanent Saint Paddy's Day.
So, overall, as subjective as it is, yeah, in my opinion, I think they come out as pretty good value.
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