Hopefully one of the newer grads (or current zips) can give me a quick reminder on this (google didn't help).

My boots have been in storage until recently - didn't have much use for them moving around with the Marines. I made the Texas/Texas A&M game in Nov, but Holick's was gone. I found the Meltonian "London Tan" cream on Amazon. I think that I used to rub the cream in with an old t-shirt and then polish with a pair of pantyhose to get the shine. Just looking to get them looking nice again so I can display them on my bookcase. Thanks and Gig 'Em.

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but Holick's was gone

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It's there, just in a different location. Head north on Wellborn past University. It's on the right near Salty Dog and the Corps photography people.

And that was pretty much my same method; it was always fun getting strange looks at walgreen when you're buying a few pairs of pantyhose.

[This message has been edited by mickeyrig06sq3 (edited 9/10/2012 11:28p).]

Pantyhose? Never used it on boots "back in the day". Boots were used to remove pantyhose, however.




Sure you weren't buying it for other reasons?

Not in or around College Station. Remove pantyhose? Waka waka waka....

yeah, something about the fabric/nylon could really heat up the cream with friction and give a better shine

[This message has been edited by Critter00 (edited 9/11/2012 7:42a).]

We always used pantyhose on all our shoes.

I always stuffed a rolled up shirt or old socks in the panty hose until it filled the panty hose and buffed the boots with that. Probably the same result as using the panty hose by itself but it seemed to work really well.

Yeah, rub it in evenly over a section of leather with and old t-shirt. Once it's dried, you rub it with the pantyhose. I rolled another old t-shirt up into a log shape and slipped it into the pantyhose, and then doubled over the pantyhose as many times as possible over the shirt without stretching the pantyhose, and used that to lightly buff the leather. Worked really well, and it buffed evenly.

Holicks had some other product, I can't recall the name though. Something like "leather lotion," it was a good leather cleaner and also helped keep the leather soft. I used to use it on the outside to clean the leather before applying a new polish coat, as well as on the inside to keep it from drying out. It also did a really good job taking off the black spots from where the spurs rested against the leather. It came in a cylindrical bottle and looked like white hand lotion.

I was always a kiwi brown shoe polish, soft cotton t-shirt, candle, and pantyhosed stuffed with athletic sock kind of a zip. The old crapper rumor was that rain wiped out Meltonian but that real shoe polish 'burned' in held up better. Still have my boots and the gold spurs. Inside are two very old rolls of toilet paper to keep the barrels from breaking down and the pantyhose buffer.

We used pantyhose as the final step. It worked very well. It was also good to use right before the drill at halftime. A little buffing and the polish ruined by the sun shined up again.

My date never liked putting them back on, though.

That cream stuff sucks for anything other than creating your desired color. Was helping my buddy shine his boots and that stuff is for the birds. Once you get the cream on there and you have the color you like, go to the brown Kiwi. Neutral is unnecessary in the end, too. Extended, unrequested explanation from my shoe shining experience down at the Tomb is as follows:

Kiwi is nothing but low grade wax. However, within that garbage low grade stuff, there is oil and the oil within is what truly brings out the best shine. When applying Kiwi to your preferred rag, there are two methods: swiping and pressing. Swiping gets the wax crap and pressing gets the oil. Though you need to build a small base with the wax, you can't cake it on. Once you have a couple of wax coats on the boots, then you go to oil. We used to sand between wax coats (1600 grit or higher) to help create the true glass appearance. Storing your Kiwi upside down helps the wax rise to the top, as long as the Kiwi is stored in a moderately warm place. It does not require a whole lot of oil per coat, and you'll realize this once you get it started. Don't dip your rag into water. Use a spray bottle. It's easier to establish a good ratio of oil and water with a spray bottle. When you're done, you'll notice small swirl marks from shining. Just take a cotton ball, get it wet (run it under sink but squeeze it out so it's not dripping) and go over the shoe in small shining swirls as if you were shining it with a rag. Then blow the water off with an air compressor. If you don't have one (and I don't, either), you can use one of those inflatable air mattress pumps. Works just as well. Boots, boots complete.