These Boots Are Made For Walking

 I might have reached the pinnacle of my sewing career because.....  I altered boots!

If you were not provided with the gift of patience or you don't have enough time to read through this missive about boots, click here and watch my video.  You can even speed that up so you can cut to the chase. 

If you enjoy my lengthy stories, carry on reading and then go back and watch the video.

I was not given the gift of height and though my legs are longish for my height, most winter boots look silly on me.  If they don't come to the middle of my kneecap, the best they can usually do is hit just below it and it feels like I'm clomping around in someone else's boots.

I'd say I feel like I'm clomping around in my mother's boots, but a) she's shorter than me and b) in my lifetime, I have never seen her even entertain putting on a pair of boots like these.

It's like I'm parading around boots that belong to someone far taller than myself.

If I ran the boot world, I would offer several shaft heights for all boots, just as they can offer widths in many shoes.  I bet many shorter people would love to be able to ask for boots that are several inches shorter so they look stylish, feel comfortable and actually want to wear them.  Even the wildly expensive boot manufacturers don't offer more than one shaft height, as far as I can tell.  

If shoes can come in wide widths, why can't boots comes in 2 heights?

It would also be GREAT if companies selling boots could get on the same page about where exactly the shaft height is measured.  They do not always pick the same starting point so even though a lot of them now offer that information, 15 inches from one company doesn't fit like 15 inches from another so it's still very frustrating.

Sidebar:  while I am an English rider, I do not wear tall boots and never plan to. I don't show, so I don't have an reason to actually buy them, but one of the many reasons I don't wear them is due to the shaft height.  I realize riding boots come in different heights but I don't trust that they will fit well and comfortably.  

I'm also not great at maintaining my leather when it comes to riding.

And also, I can't imagine being trapped in tall boots at the height of summer heat and humidity.

Paddock boots and half chaps have always sufficed for me.

Anyway, back to fashion boots.

I've had this pair of boots and I like the fit in the foot but every winter, I look at them thinking I'm sure I can take them down an inch or two and they'd fit so much better.  I will only buy boots that are actually leather, and I avoid elastic in them as much as possible.  This means they are usually more expensive than what I want to pay (faux leather and super stretchy boots tend to be a lot cheaper) but I prefer real over fake so i occasionally haul out the cash.  

Every time I started to toy with the idea of cutting them out and resewing them, I'd think about how much they cost and how sad I would be if I ruined them.  Was the taller height that I don't want a better choice than possibly ruining them and having nothing?

This week, the answer to that question was yes.  If I'm going to continue wearing these boots then they have to come down a notch or two and if they get ruined, I wasn't going to wear them much as they were, so I was ready to cut my losses.

The process was nowhere near as hard as it seemed like it would be.  There's a slight elastic gusset that gave me pause but I plowed ahead and made it work.  The hardest part was taking everything apart because they were sewn and glued.  The glue released pretty easily and the sewing was very easy to replicate.  

The zipper wasn't that hard to deal with because they didn't have zipper stops at the top, they just curled the tape into the facing, which is what I do with zippers as well. I have no idea how to put in zipper stops and I wasn't going to reinvent the wheel here if the factory hadn't even done it.

Several people asked if my sewing machine was going to be strong enough to handle it.  This particular leather isn't very thick and the facing and lining are quite thin too.  The hardest part was deal with the zipper teeth so I just hand cranked over that part.  My Bernina 1001 sailed right through as I expected it would.  It's not a digital machine and it has the heavy duty feeling I don't get from more modern machines.  I didn't try my Bernina 350 but I think that would have been fine too.  Trying to work with this as an actual boot was tough because it limited some of the movements I wanted to do, but that wasn't anything related to my sewing machine.

The result, as you will see in the video is definitely similar to the original.  Looking at the inside of the original, it wasn't quite as neat as I would have expected, so when mine was less than perfect, I felt like it was comparable to the original.  I don't think these boots are the highest quality out there, so I'm sure less than perfect seams wouldn't have put these in the reject pile.  I did get them from DSW, so maybe they were rejected.  Who would know?

I don't know if I'll do this again.  I'm certainly not on a quest to shorten all the boots out there and I would never do it for someone else.  I have a pair of black tall boots that are on the verge of being too tall but I don't know if I will tackle shortening them this winter or if I really care.    This little experiment has made this pair much more wearable and that was my goal.

If you're too tired from all of these words to scroll back up, here's the link to the video.