Gabor Perforated Leather Insole Size 39 – Built for the Ninth Hour

Description

Gabor Perforated Leather Insole Size 39 – Built for the Ninth Hour – the British 6 in Gabor terms, a full length punched hide bed made to Continental 39 and packed in pairs

Nine in the morning is not when shoes go wrong. Four in the afternoon is. Your feet spread across a working day, a little from standing and a good deal from warmth, and a shoe that was roomy at breakfast has quietly run out of space by the time you are walking back to the station. That is the hour a bed has to survive, and most of them make it worse.

A punched leather sock is the one addition that behaves at both ends of the clock. It costs you almost no height, so the morning shoe is unchanged, and it does its real work later on in the day by moving the warm damp air out through the holes instead of holding it against your sole, where it swells everything it touches.

Eleven pounds ninety nine buys the pair here, made to a Continental 39 and worn by anyone taking a British 6.

Why choose this gabor perforated leather insole size 39?

• The holes are the whole point. Two rows run the outline and a broad field covers the forefoot. Air moves up through them each time your foot lifts and presses, so the small bellows action of walking ventilates the shoe rather than pumping the same warm air about underneath you.
• It costs you no room at all. At roughly a millimetre this is a lining rather than a layer. The shoe that fits at nine still fits at nine, which is the whole trick, because anything thicker solves the afternoon by ruining the morning and you end up carrying the shoes home.
• Hide takes damp up and lets it go. Leather draws moisture in through the day and releases it again when the shoe is off and standing open. A synthetic sock cannot do that. It simply holds what your foot gives it, and by mid afternoon you are standing on all of it.
• Your foot presses into it, not onto it. After a fortnight the grain has hollowed a fraction under the heel and under the ball. Small as that sounds, it spreads the load across more of your sole instead of concentrating it on two points, and late in the day that is where the ache comes from.
• It goes over the existing lining. Nothing has to be pulled out and nothing is glued down. Lay it in, and if you decide by Friday that you prefer the shoe bare it lifts straight back out with no trace that it was ever in there.
• Cut to a 39 and priced at £11.99. No trimming, no raw edge, and no curling at the toe within a month. It arrives at the right length on the grey Gabor card and lies properly flat from the very first wearing, and a pair costs less than a sandwich lunch in town.

How to use the gabor perforated leather insole size 39

Two minutes will see both of them fitted, and the only step that wants real care is seating the heel end firmly before you set off anywhere.

1. Slide the leather bed in, punched side facing your sole.
2. Send it backwards as far as the heel will allow.
3. Flatten the sides against the wall with finger and thumb.
4. Check that no corner at all is riding up the shoe side.
5. Repeat with the second shoe and compare the two positions.
6. Give them an hour indoors before a full day out on them.

My tip as a shoe specialist

Test the sock lining you already have at four in the afternoon, not when the shoes come off in the evening. By bedtime the shoe has been open for an hour and has begun to dry, so it tells you nothing. Mid afternoon, run a finger right down to where the ball of your foot sits, and then back to the heel. Damp at the front and dry behind means the material against your sole is the problem. Damp all through, front and back, and the shoe itself is simply too closed a thing, which no insole made anywhere is going to fix for you.

Specifications

At a glance

• Continental size: 39, which is a British 6
• Foot length: About 246mm along the sole
• Face: Punched genuine hide
• Coverage: Whole footbed, heel to toe
• Build: A single slim layer
• Goes in: On top of the lining
• Supplied: Two per card
• Maker: Gabor
• Cost: £11.99 the pair

Frequently asked questions

Will it make my shoes feel tighter?

It should not. At around a millimetre it takes up less room than a thick sock does, and you are laying it over the lining rather than adding a built up bed. If it was snug by four already, that is the shoe.

Do the holes go all the way through?

Yes, right the way through the hide. That is exactly what lets the air move about as you walk, rather than sitting warm and quite still between your sole and the shoe underneath it.

Can I wash it?

No, and it does not need it. Lift it out, stand it somewhere airy overnight and wipe the face over with a cloth wrung out nearly dry. Water and heat both harden hide.

Where can I buy the gabor perforated leather insole size 39 in the UK?

Stock of this sits with us at Shoespecialist.co.uk. Anything ordered by 5pm during the week is despatched that same afternoon, £50 and over travels free, and the returns window runs 60 days.