I have this old quality pair of New Balance shoes that I just love and I must have bought at least 10 years ago, but they’re definitely on the way out.
Has anyone bought a court-style athletic white (mostly or at least partially) leather upper tennis shoe recently that they can recommend? I want something well-built, somewhat traditional-looking like this: Link
Does anyone make such a thing any more for 150 bucks or less?
I wear Nike Air Monarchs when I’m not wearing boots. They were well-built the last time I bought a pair, but that was also more than ten years ago, so they may have gone downhill since then.
(Edit: oops, somehow missed the multiple requests for ‘leather’. Still a good shoe, though.)
That price point should be easy to find something that fits what you want (heck even under $100 should be fairly doable). There are a lot of synthetic materials these days, but almost every major manufacturer still makes white leather shoes.
I dunno, man–everything I look at these days under 100 bucks seems to be all synthetic. For instance those ones I linked to on Zappos’s don’t mention leather at all IIRC, and they’re over $100.
There used to be big box-style sporting goods stores at the mall that had a great selection of athletic shoes but those are gone now, and whatever survives at the indoor mall these days just has neon-looking crap for teens and twenty-somethings, grrr.
I guess I’ll try a Google search for white leather upper tennis shoe and see what that finds.
OK, I did find these.. I was pretty disgusted by the lack of quality last time I bought some New Balance trainers a couple of years ago (they were made in the USA supposedly but were crap compared to the ones I mentioned in my OP, which were made in China) but these seem to be getting good reviews. As always there seems to be some doubt as to whether they’re true to size–luckily Zappo’s ships both ways free.
Why not go with good ol’ reliable pair of white K-Swiss? It’s as classic a look as an old pair of Levi’s, and they’re still made of leather, other than the inside of the tongue.
Almost certainly not leather, but maybe it reduces the price enough of the alternative. I spotted cheap white gym shoes at Costco for $20 yesterday.
Actually I’d never even heard of K-Swiss until I looked on Zappos. They must not advertise much. Thanks for the tip though. I ordered some nice looking New Balance ones that were (though they ran 1/2 a size small, but I was forewarned by the reviews) perfect…except for the fact that the arch support for the left foot was totally missing vs the right shoe, which was perfect. WTF is up with quality control these days, seriously. So I sent them back and we’ll see if another pair of the same thing works out.
I only typically buy sub-$80 shoes, but swear by New Balance. Granted, not getting fancy all-leather stuff either but in the economic category, they’ve always outperformed any other brand I’ve tried.