Heritage British-Made Women's Boots — Voted by the Community

Boot making in Britain grew out of the wider shoemaking trade, and Northampton became its best-known centre. The town had a shoemakers' guild by 1401, and in the 1640s its shoemakers made thousands of pairs of boots and shoes for armies raised by Parliament. Welted construction, in which a strip of leather is stitched to the upper and insole and the sole is then attached to it, was done by hand for centuries. Machinery reached the Northamptonshire trade from around 1860, and the first Goodyear welting machines, developed for the American Charles Goodyear Jr, arrived in the 1870s. They made welted footwear quicker to produce while keeping the ability to resole it. British footwear makers have long produced sturdy leather boots for work and everyday wear, using the same cutting, closing, lasting and welting processes as for their shoes. Boot making sits within this shared tradition rather than standing apart from it.