[masraum]

Originally Posted by Zeke

I've never heard of pouring water in a boot. Do manufacturers really condone that?

Tobra has been pushing that for a long time, and he's a foot guy, so he knows. I've never done it as he described, BUT...

many years ago (college) I worked part time at a grocery store. When my black sneakers wore out, I started wearing my black Florsheim penny loafers because I never wore them any other time. I got rained on helping little old ladies out to their cars in the FL rain. The shoes ended up being EXTREMELY comfortable. They formed to my foot as if they'd been made for my feet. I think the soles wore out or something, so I stopped by a shoe repair place with them (didn't know anything about leather shoes) and asked "can you fix that?" I think I picked them up a day or two later. They had been refinished so they were shiny and the soles had been replaced. They were like new shoes except that they still fit me like a custom shoe.

I've actually been tempted to try Tobra's method since something very similar worked well for me before, but I have a hard time doing that to perfectly good, expensive shoes. I suspect I'd be mostly happy with the results.

I'd wear wool socks when I did it. I assume you'd want to condition the shoes when you got done, but I don't know.