Two pairs, on rotation — the case for fewer shoes
The shoe rotation · Shoes
A cobbler told me once that the kindest thing you can do for a pair of leather shoes is to not wear them two days running. Leather needs a night to dry out and remember its shape. So I keep two pairs and alternate, and both have outlasted everything I bought to replace them.
There's nothing aspirational about a shoe rotation of two. That's the appeal. The decision is already made; the maintenance is the whole ritual. A brush, a tin of polish, the occasional trip to the cobbler who shakes his head and resoles them anyway.
Buy less, walk more, resole when it's time. Most things, it turns out, want to be repaired more than they want to be replaced.
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