Willie's Handmade Boots Monkey Boot

A sale on waxed buttero sides at Rocky Mountain Leather… No, really. I was shopping for some Minerva and saw that there was a pretty good sale going. I got to thinking about how I had seen plenty of white waxed makeups, but never any black waxed builds. It made me curious about what one would look like. I knew that I was about to get started making my own boots soon, but didn’t feel confident that I’d be ready to make something for the dome, let alone with something as delicate as a leather with a waxed surface like that. I figured if these were potentially going to be my last boots I buy, I may as well try and go all out and do something as custom as possible. Unfortunately I couldn’t find anyone that would do a stitchdown monkey boot. However I did run across Willie’s new monkey boot pattern that he had just finished prototyping and it seemed like a perfect fit for a rough grungy black boot that would turn into a golden bronze veg tan beauty. I love playing around with leathers I’ve never seen before and getting to see where they go. Only one of the five boots I’ve domed in the last three years has been a leather Id seen used before, and for me that’s the goal. To boldly go where no boot has gone before… or something like that. This was definitely going to be the biggest unknown to date for me.

Did several measurements with photos and sent a foot tracing along with the leather when I sent it out to him.

There were some communication issues on both sides unfortunately. I had some specific details that I wanted that weren’t followed through on and overall it wasn’t the best experience. It was easy enough to get in touch with him and he was super friendly and on board to do the pair, but he didn’t ask for many details, and the details I asked for seemed to get overlooked. I had wanted a 6 or 7 inch version, black stitching on the upper and welt, and raw cord soles. But they showed up full height, with brown upper stitching, white welt stitching, and jade supergrip soles. I let him know that I could do the resoling since I had some raw cord soles (this is why those marks around the base of the upper are there. Inexperienced cobbling on my part) and it would be significantly cheaper for him to send me the right size heels rather than ship the whole thing to the Philippines and back. He also offered to refund me $50, but I never received that. Shipping was also a very surprising $95usd, which hadn’t been mentioned before, and was a bit of a bummer. He got other things right like the edge finish and hardware, and while I didn’t totally love the undertones of the black tongue he did remember that I had said if there wasn’t enough material in the side I sent that he could use a black leather for the tongue. There are some minor things in terms of some puckering at the toe, but it’s a relatively inexpensive custom boot with a flat welt and a fair thick stiff veg tan leather. I’m not going to whine too much. The pattern is beautiful and for the most part they’re very nice boots, and I think with more clear communication it would totally be worth working with Willie.