Name: How to recognize good vs. bad quality shoes | Justine Leconte
Uploaded: 2017-09-28T13:17:36.000Z
Duration: 11 min 22 s
Description: Thousands of YouTube videos with English-Chinese subtitles! Now you can learn to understand native speakers, expand your vocabulary, and improve your pronunciation...

hi everyone its Justine. when you buy
shoes the price and all the brands are

Adverbs of manner

not indicators that you're getting good
quality, unfortunately. but there are

several details you can easily pay
attention to when you're shopping for

shoes, that will save you a lot of
trouble slash pain slash regrets. I'm

gonna show you shoes from my own
collection, which you've seen in the

previous video a few weeks ago about my
shoes and you will see the materials as

well as the construction, both things
matter tremendously at the end of this

video you also get some shoe shopping
tips that you might or might not know,

it's not always obvious, let's go,
first, the material is really important

shoes are usually made of fabric or
suede, which is a little bit brushed

leather, or flat regular leather or
plastic, most shoes fit into those four

categories. the shoe will tell you.
for example: on those ballerinas

it says here (I still have a label
underneath) that this is suede leather,

the inside is leather but you see it's
not suede,  it's not hairy, it is regular flat leather

and the sole is plastic. on this shoe
here which is a made in France,

handcrafted shoe, you can see inside on
this label it says the upper is in

leather, the inside here, everything is in
leather and the sole also, here you see

a plastic element, I'll get back to that
in a minute,

but basically the shoe will tell you,
each material can be good or bad

depending on how you see it, leather is
made from animal skin so that's an

obvious argument against leather if
you're vegan or a vegetarian, it is

sensitive to water and sun. it is a very
noble material so it needs to be

prepared before it's used on shoes. that
makes it more expensive, more premium. and

it is soft and flexible because it's
it's skin so it gets more and more

comfortable over time when you wear the
shoes. it's also quite breathable and it

is biodegradable. plastic on the other
side. or the official name is

polyurethane. the
scientifical term it P.U., it's

plastic, is a lot cheaper which is the
main reason why many cheaper brands will

use that in their shoe production. it's
very durable more. durable than leather

but it's so durablel that it is not
biodegradable. leather needs roughly 50

years to biodegrade. PU needs 500 years.
it is less breathable than leather. it is

in fact not breathable. it's plastic. it is
also a bit sensitive to UV rays and it

might lose or change its color if you
leave the shoes in the sun. and when you

hear that shoes are made of vegan
leather, so-called "vegan leather", it's in

fact PU that is prepared to make it look
like it's leather, but it is PU, it is

plastic, coming back to leather, for one
second. I forgot something.

not all leathers are good quality. there is
leather and leather. depending on where

and how its produced. for instance if the
leather is very thin flexible and supple.

it's probably higher quality. also if you
see a little scratch on a shoe when you

try the shoes on in store. and the
scratch has the same color as the

surface of the leather. that's a very
good sign, it means that the skin has

been prepared properly. it has been
tanned well so that's higher quality. if

you have a scratch on your shoes later,
it would be really easy to just fix it

with shoe cream that is transparent,
instead of having to look for a tinted

cream that has exactly the color of your
shoes. to finish on the materials let's

talk very quickly about ribbons and
embellishments and stuff that's usually

shown as decorative elements on top of
the shoe. the throat,

this part here, the front upper part,
let's say that's leather and on top of

that you have ribbons or beads sewn into
the into the leather, the leather is

flexible so it's stretching and it's
supposed to bounce back into place but

the beading on top is stiffly sewn onto
it: this is gonna make the holes of the

sewing grow with time, you can end up
with holes in your leather or and the

wool stuff that is sewn on top stiff
ends everything so your shoes are going

to be a lot less comfortable, I am not a
fan

of embellishments and stuff on top of
shoes... you see that in fancy shoe stores.

cheap stores or also on super high-end
designer shoes: I don't think that's a

sign of quality and durability... let's
move on to the construction of the shoe

the next super important part. example:
that's the upper here outside and inside,

both matter, that is the sole, the heel -
where it is placed

matters a lot - and then the arch here is
especially important. the higher the

heels the more that is important. let's
dig deeper into each of those elements.

usually the upper and the sole are
produced separately and then they are

attached together either with glue or
with stitches. both methods can be good

if they're done properly. here's how. if
you see stitches like on this shoe here.

all around. then the thread of the
stitches should be waxed. that's

extremely important. you can know that if
you scratch a little bit with your nail,

or here, and you don't see little hairs
coming out,  that's a good sign if the

threat remains compact and flat, so to
speak.

wax makes the thread more durable
because it protects it and it also makes

the seam waterproof. very important. if
the sole is glued instead of being

stitched like on those ones then take
the time before buying the shoes to look

at all the edges. here you should see
glue nowhere. if you see visible glue

somewhere. it's a sign of very cheap
production. so take the time look at both

shoes from all angles. the salesperson is
going to think that you weird but

that's okay because you know what you're
doing :-) all the edges should be impeccable.

that's actually a good shoe and if you
have edge paint like here, the leather here

is this color but they painted the edges
to match the color of the heel and the

rubber sole, which is good, then this edge
paint should also look impeccable, which

is the case. then under the sole what do
you see? this is just leather: you see

it's absorbing a lot of things I stepped
onto, it's dirty and it's starting to be

eaten up by all the little sand pieces,
glass pieces, little stones I stepped onto.

the sole is starting to deteriorate
here. that's why I prefer a rubber sole.

it's less slippery than that, huge factor
for me. and you could technically just

replace this rubber sole when it gets
used up. without that leather part

starting to get damaged. if you buy shoes
like that and you want to add a rubber

sole. any shoe repair shop around the
corner of your house can do that. and you

can just replace the rubber sole every
now and then. when it needs it. the next

point is the placement of the heel under
the shoe: here are 2 examples. on this one,

you can tell that the entire heel is
really in the middle of this part of

your foot. that's proper heel placement.
that's another good example: you see the

heel starts more at the back but it's
going that way, so the part that is

supported on the floor is really under
your heel, where it needs to be.

sometimes you see shoes, especially ankle
boots: if they're cheap and poorly

constructed, the heel goes down here
completely vertically. that can't be, the

food doesn't work like that,
that's poor construction. then the

arch is essential, especially on high
heels. you see this curve here? it should

follow the natural curve of your foot. if
you wear those shoes and you feel that

you are like crrrrr in them, that's terrible.
the food should naturally lie on it and

feel comfortable, and have if possible the
full surface as a contact point. now you

might think ballerinas have no arch... they
are completely flat, so by definition