About Us
Iron Boots started in 2015 in Guangzhou, and now we are a small studio with 6 folks in total. Our brand owner, boot designer and maker Kai is also a boot enthusiast, and he started to make his own boots after he realized that there is no such boot in the market that can reach his bars on all fronts. We started in China, and later launched in Japan. We have also got a lot of customers in United States, Canada, Australia, and Europe. We have received a lot of orders and compliments from customers all around the world, even from some shoemakers and bootmakers.
Construction
Iron Boots are all fully hand made with channelled insole construction. They are all hand welted, hand last, hand bottomed, and also hand-sewn outsole stitch. Our lasts are designed and created by ourselves, and have been refined for a few versions based on customer feedback. We believe great boots should have not only great craftsmanship, great pattern, great last, great leather, but also great aesthetics.
We sourced most of our materials in Europe and North America. We believe it is also a way to pay back to the community here. But when there is no perfect option out there, we will invest to build it ourselves. For example, we have our own branded rubber sole, because the shape and design of most rubber soles in the market don't fit with the design of our last very well. Our heel is smaller than most heritage boots, which looks more like heels from those high end dress shoes. It's designed this way because this setup will be more conformable for walking. Also our waist is quite narrow, which is another thing you might see more often in great dress shoes. All of those make us hard to use some well known branded rubber soles. So we decided to do customized build with a sole factory to mold soles in the shape that can fit our last well.
Another special thing about our boots is that we are not trying to build "heavy tanks". Instead, we want to build boots and shoes that are strong, but also as light weight as possible. We believe not everyone wants or needs to wear heavy duty boots in their day to day commute. So we are trying to remove extra weight in our boots as much as possible, without impacting the quality and longevity.
For other special details about our construction, we use wool as filler instead of cork, and we use leather shank instead of steel. Our leather lining is using extremely high quality leather, which is usually used as upper for a lot of boots and shoes. It feels very strong, and also quite smooth. The cost of our leather lining is also extremely high, close to some brands' upper leather. Starting from early 2021, all our boots (sold overseas) will be using leather for both heel counter and toe puff.