There’s the old cliche that women immediately notice the quality of a man’s shoes. Some of this is attribute to gender stereotypes and the notion that females are opposed by those things you just think of as covering for your feet. However, there is undoubtedly some truth to the cliche. Some published accounts state that 64% of women judge a man’s fashion sense based on his shoes.
So if you’re stuck while trying to pick out a nice pair of shoes, here’s what you need to know.
Style and Quality Selection:
Even if you don’t wear a suit everyday you still need two pairs of dress shoes for all formal occasions. There’s no reason to go crazy in your dress shoe selection. It’s more stylish to stick to the classic looks, like wingtips or cap-toes. Depending on lifestyle your frequency of dress shoe wear varies. If you wear them often save money by purchasing a midrange quality pair that won’t break the bank but will stand the test of time. You’ll be grinding these down every day so you will need to replace them in one to two years. If you wear dress shoes only occasionally then spring for an expensive quality pair. After this purchase you will probably only need that one quality pair for the rest of your life.
Color and Material Selection:
Just as with style selection you are going to stick to the classics here, black and brown. For the black get a classic full black that is deep and has a healthy shine. For the brown you will have more options as there are copious shades such as tan, cognac, oxblood, mahogany, brown, light brown, and several others. We prefer to have just a standard brown or mahogany as my regular pair because they look great with light color clothes, like khaki and white. If you go too dark with your brown dress shoes they only coordinate with darker clothes and you already have your black pair for this. The only material you should consider purchasing is genuine leather. Authentic leather is hardy, stylish, and comfortable. Leather dress shoes complete with leather soles can be expensive but worth the price as a well made pair can last a lifetime. Resist the urge to purchase patent leather dress shoes. Some black highly glossy dress shoes will be made of this material. This high sheen is currently only in fashion when paired with a tuxedo.
