Ranking Men's RTW Shoes over $500 (28 BEST & WORST Brands!)

About this video

The Gazette team provides a comprehensive ranking and grading of ready-to-wear shoe brands priced $500 and above, evaluating factors like construction quality, materials, design, and value. Using letter grades from A to F, they assess over 30 established and niche shoemakers from around the world, including heritage brands from England, Italy, and Central Europe, while explaining their reasoning for each rating.

Key takeaways

• The Gazette team argues that shoe quality and construction methods—such as Goodyear-welting versus hand-welting—significantly impact durability and value, with hand-welted shoes like those from Vass offering exceptional quality at competitive prices
• The Gazette team contends that heritage and brand recognition don’t always justify premium pricing; many expensive brands like Salvatore Ferragamo and Tod’s receive lower grades due to poor value propositions relative to their costs
• The Gazette team finds that British Northampton shoemakers (Crockett & Jones, Tricker’s, Alfred Sargent) and Central European makers (Vass, Heinrich Dinkelacker) often deliver superior aesthetics and craftsmanship compared to more fashion-forward or luxury-branded alternatives

Episode details: published April 1, 2022 · 358K views · 28:27 long. Summary written by Self Growth Videos from the episode itself. The style guidance summarized here is the Gentleman’s Gazette team’s own teaching and opinion, presented for education; product recommendations are theirs, not ours. Summaries are written by Self Growth Videos from each video itself.

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