Learning how to polish shoes properly takes one evening. Doing it badly for years is what ruins good leather. The purpose of polishing is not shine. The purpose is to put fat and moisture back into a skin that loses both every time you wear it, and then to build a thin protective film on top. Shine is a by-product, and on most of the shoe it should stay modest. This is the method we use in the workshop.
What you need
- A pair of shoe trees, ideally unvarnished cedar, that fit the shoe.
- A horsehair brush for cleaning, and a second horsehair brush for buffing. Keep one brush per colour family if you can.
- A small welt brush, or an old toothbrush, for the seam between welt and upper.
- Cream polish in a matching or slightly lighter shade. Cream feeds and colours.
- Wax polish in the same shade or neutral. Wax protects and shines.
- Soft cotton cloths. An old cotton shirt works better than anything sold for the purpose. Avoid synthetic microfibre.
- A small dish of clean water.
- A leather cleaner or saddle soap, used occasionally rather than every time.
How to polish shoes, step by step
- Tree the shoes first. Put the trees in before you touch the leather. They hold the shape taut so you are working on a flat surface, and they stop you pressing creases into a soft upper.
- Remove the laces. It takes twenty seconds and it is the difference between polishing the whole shoe and polishing the parts you can reach.
- Clean the shoe. Brush the whole upper firmly with the cleaning brush. Work the welt brush along the seam where the welt meets the upper, where grit collects and stays. If there is dried mud or old wax build-up, wipe the shoe with a cloth barely damp with water, or use a leather cleaner sparingly. Then let it dry fully before anything else. Polishing over dirt grinds that dirt into the grain permanently.
- Apply cream. Wrap a cloth around two fingers, take a small amount of cream, and work it into the leather in small circles. Small means less than you think, roughly a pea for one shoe. Cover the whole upper including the heel counter, the tongue and the eyelet facing. Then, and this is the part most people skip, work a little cream into the welt itself with the welt brush. The welt is leather too and it dries out first.
- Let it rest. Ten to fifteen minutes. The cream needs time to sink in rather than sit on the surface.
- Brush. Take the clean buffing brush and work briskly over the whole shoe with light, fast strokes. You are not polishing yet, you are removing the excess cream and evening out what remains. The leather should now look fed and slightly matt.
- Apply wax to the parts that need protection. Toe cap, heel counter and the lower half of the shoe near the sole. These are where the leather takes knocks and water. Use a cloth, a very thin layer, and let it dry for a few minutes.
- Buff again with the brush, then finish with a dry cotton cloth pulled taut across the leather in long strokes. Stop here for most of the shoe.
The mirror shine, and where to put it
A high shine belongs on the toe cap, and if you like, on the heel counter. Nowhere else. The vamp and the quarters flex every step, so a hard wax film there will simply crack into fine white lines within a day. Leaving the flexing areas at a soft, fed lustre is not laziness, it is how the shoe stays looking correct.
To build the shine, wrap a cotton cloth tightly around your index and middle fingers so there are no wrinkles in the working face. Pick up a very small amount of wax. Add one drop of water to the cloth, not to the shoe. Work in small circles over the toe cap with light pressure. What you are doing is laying down successive microscopic layers of wax, each one filling the grain a little more, with the water keeping the wax from dragging and stopping you from lifting off the layer you just put down.
Then repeat. Ten or twelve passes, each one thin, each one with a fresh drop of water. The surface will go through a cloudy stage where it looks worse than when you started. Keep going and it clears. When you can read reflected light off it, stop. Finish with a clean dry section of cloth and no wax.
How often
Brush the shoes after every wearing, with trees in. That takes a minute and it does more for the leather than anything else on this page. Cream them every eight to ten wearings, or whenever the leather looks thirsty, which it announces by going flat and slightly grey in the flex creases. Wax as often as you like the look of it. A shoe worn once a week and brushed each time needs creaming perhaps once a month.
More is not better. Over-creaming leaves the leather soft and the surface tacky, and it collects dust.
What not to do
Do not use silicone sprays or so-called instant shine sponges. Silicone seals the surface, stops the leather taking cream, and cannot be removed without stripping. Shoes treated with it eventually crack because nothing has reached the fibres for years.
Do not build wax on the flexing areas, and do not apply polish over dirt. Do not dry wet shoes near a radiator or with a hairdryer, because heat drives out the fats and shrinks the fibres. Wet shoes go on trees, away from any heat source, for a full day. And do not wax the walking surface of a leather sole, which only makes it slippery.
Do not wear the same pair two days running. Leather needs a day to release the moisture it took from your foot. This single habit extends the life of a pair more than any product.
Cordovan
Shell cordovan is not calf and does not behave like it. Its fibres run in a dense mat rather than in layers, so it does not crease sharply, it rolls. Use cordovan cream or a neutral cream very sparingly, never wax in any quantity, and never water on the surface. Brush it hard with a horsehair brush, which is what actually brings up the depth. If rolls have formed across the vamp, a deer bone or a smooth glass bottle worked gently over the leather will flatten them. Cordovan also spots if rained on, and the marks usually settle back down with brushing and time, so resist the urge to treat them immediately.
Suede and other napped leathers
Nothing on this page applies to suede. No cream, no wax, no water. Use a rubber or crepe suede brush to lift the nap, brushing in one direction, and a suede eraser or a fine abrasive block on shiny patches where the nap has been crushed flat. Treat a new pair with a suede protector spray before the first wearing and repeat it a few times a season. For salt stains, a cloth barely damp with white vinegar, dabbed and then dried and re-brushed, is usually enough. Grease marks generally do not come out, which is why suede belongs on dry days.
Our shoes are made with calf uppers and leather soles, so this is the method we would send home with the pair. If you want to know how a particular leather will age under this care, raise it when you book a consultation or write to us on the contact page. You can see the finishes we work with across our oxford shoes and loafers.