THE EASY GUIDE TO A MIRROR SHOE SHINE - SET THE SHOE STANDARD IN YOUR LIFE

[Music] hello folks and welcome back to the chaps guide my name is Ashe and I'm your curator here on this channel where we like to talk about self development ideas style tips and anything which helped us to be better chaps we're on the journey together I'm learning alongside you as well so it's a bit of good fun now today I'm getting back to a subject which is often spoken about when it comes to men's style and it's a topic which I really am quite passionate about and that's men's Footwear and not just you know different styles and types of shoes and boots but actually how to look after them and how to make them work for you in other words give them a good shine and make sure that when you walk around when you present yourself in a good pro shoes they will you know really a signal your arrival in a group of people they will indicate to other people that you're somebody who actually looks after their shoes and goes that extra bit because what I'm going to talk about today is applying a mirror shine to a pair of gentlemen's black toe cap Oxford's so the classic gentlemen's uniform shoe which is often worn in the most formal situations and offer obviously in that situation that's where you want it to look it's absolute best and I don't advocate putting mirror shines and all shoes because it can be a bit of a maintenance nightmare you know when you're applying wax polish to things you have to keep that standard up because nothing looks worse than a mirror shine which is sort of gone past its best and is it with divots and chunks missing out of that wax finish on the shoe and it actually doesn't present you in a very good light that's all it makes you look a bit scruffy if I'm honest but certainly the shoes which I wear for my most formal situations I do indeed apply the mirror polish which I'm about to show you has always worked for me so I'm going to spin the camera round and I'm going to show you how I apply a mirror polish to a brand new pair of shoes which has never had any wax or anything on it before so it's not just showing you the mirror polish it's how I would a pair of shoes from from the box to mirror finish so let's go and have a look ok then so here we are here those wonderful sandal shoes and I'm gonna so looking through a comparison you can see how they are right now there is sort of never been touched never had any form of polish conditioner wax anything at all placed on these shoes they are as they were manufactured in fact there's a little layer of dust over some of them so I'm gonna just take the left-hand side one and I'm going to treat this shoe and I'm gonna show you how I apply a mirror shine to a pair of shoes which has never been touched before now to do that I want to make sure that shoe is prepared and ready to accept that mirror shine so the products I'm going to be using today first of all I'm going to condition the shoe I'm going to use some Sofia a renovate all which is kind of the industry standard when it comes to conditioning hydrating and protecting that leather now these shoes as I say have never been conditioned so it's likely they've been on you know well I know for a start for the last 23 years they've been in my attic which is a hot in the summertime cold in the wintertime environment so lots of shifts in temperature in fact I can see that they have been subjected to attack by vermin there's a little divot missing out of a little tiny bit of leather missing there you probably won't be able to see it where a mouse no doubt that's how to go at it so they're likely to have been extremely dry they not had much care at all so the renovate or a very important stage to prepare these shoes to make sure that they're ready to receive the polish after I've applied the renovate or I'm going to apply some Sofia Palma dia shoe cream in black because this following on from the renovate or which will condition the shoe and add some waxes and oils this will then add more waxes and oils and importantly it would provide some pigmentation so where the shoe you know admittedly this one hasn't been in the Sun but if you've got a pair of shoe which has been leached of color in some way the comedy of shoe cream will replace that with some pigmentation after that well then there comes the wax so the the Sofia Madhavi or wax polish I'm gonna use to apply the first coat of all over wax to this shoe to get it ready to take the mirror shine and that's just gonna get the shoe to where it would be normally day today and then finally to get that mirror shine which I'm just going to apply to the toe cap I'm going to use some modality or mirror gloss which is just basically an enhanced version of the the normal shoe cream there so the shoe wax but it's a lot drier and it allows us to build up those layers to get that mirror shine a lot quicker a lot speedier than it would take if we were applying the sort of modality or version because that one is a lot wetter and more moist and it takes longer to get that going what else am I going to use the only other products I'm going to use I'm going to use a brush to take off the products when I've used them I'm going to use a cloth to apply the the renovate or and the poverty issue cream and finally I prefer to use a little cosmetic pad to apply the wax when it comes to the mirror shine and I'm just going to use a little bit of water in a spritzer bottle which will assist me in that process so to get to that stage first of all what I need to do I'm going to clear all this away that I'm not using and the first product I'm going to need is in fact nothing more than the renovate all now the renovate all is a hydration cream basically it's a bit like face cream for a pair of shoes and in this instance all I'm going to do to apply it I'm going to take a rag this is just a piece of cotton that I've cut from a shirt you can buy specialist Chu application stuff but in reality it's it's it's cotton its material what's the difference so this is just a shirt and all I'm going to do is I'm gonna dip my finger in and I'm going to apply it all over this shoe I can apply quite liberally I can put it over the welts I can put it anywhere we need to go because all I'm doing is basically and hydrating the shoe and giving it a drink because it's been stuck in my attic for years and use you know extreme temperatures in the summertime when it gets hot up there and in the wintertime as it is now February you know daresay my attic although it's insulated will be a cold place to be so the leather is not having you know what it might enjoy in life and that's a consistent nice temperature to live within so as I say the mirror sorry the renovate or is you know it smells quite pleasant it's there's nothing unpleasant about it at all it goes on nice and easy and there we go all I'm gonna do is apply that the sole and the heel are all made of 100% leather on this lovely pair of Sanders shoes which are as I say made in the UK I've been up in Northamptonshire where a lot of the world's best ready-to-wear shoes are manufactured I'm just going to massage it in I mean I put it all over the shoe now the goal now is to just let that dry it'll take just a few minutes now this pair of shoes has been starved of hydration it's been up there for a long time this leather may well benefit from several applications of Sofia in actuality before we move on to the next phase tragically the other reality is I haven't got hours and hours to do this so like many people when we are finding time to do shoe care you have to compromise and in this case I'm having one layer of renovate all onto this pair of shoes before I move on to the next phase just gotta leave that dry for a moment or two and in fact it's virtually well it's drying it's drying already that was a very that the leather here is a very blank canvas when it comes to products so you know there's no problem with it soaking in people will say why haven't you taken the shoelaces out you can do you know I could have done in this case but the reality is again it's time it's unnecessary I can't be bothered to do that I know I just want to get on with looking after the shoes you will also note that I got a shoe free in the shoe yep that is just to aid me when it comes to applying the products and of course it's better for the shoe as well the shoe is maintained in its natural form by having that shoe tree within it and it makes life an awful lot easier for me when it comes to putting on these products if it's in place that positive resistance when I apply there some things onto the leather so there we go that's one layer of the renovate all now as I say I could go on and on I could put two three four layers onto that but truth is I don't really have the time right now so I'm gonna move on to the next phase in your situation you're unlikely to have a pair of shoes which hasn't seen any product for you know 23 years and like this patch you can see it's never even been worn never been worn whatsoever so you know a real blank canvas for us to work on now I'm going to apply the palma de Sofia shoe cream now this has the great advantage of not just imparting oils and waxes onto the leather which will protect the leather it'll start to shine the leather but it'll also has a great deal of pigmentation you can't see anything really it's just it's just gonna look black to you but the pigment will be you know it'll just refresh the color on the shoe so I get my rag again all I do wind it around the finger yet again get a little bit on this on the finger and apply it again now you'll notice that I'm using my my hands inside a rag to apply the polish many people use a dhaba you know one of these sort of shaped brushes to apply these polishes to the issues everybody to them really I mean I only use my finger because over time I have found that this helps me massage the material of products into the leather and you know I know that it's got where I wanted to go because I can feel it I can feel the contours of the shoe with my finger as I apply it and again you can go around all the leather parts or on the heel particularly you know on day to day use the heel will because it obviously is whether the shoe comes in contact with the ground this will deteriorate if you don't look after it it lose color some of the leather will you know start to wear so looking after that particularly the heel and the bits where you come in contact with the floor where where the rubber meets the road so to speak is important when it comes to day-to-day maintenance so there we go I've applied just one coat of that caveat is you know truth is if I wanted to particularly with this pair of shoes elderly not being done for a long time I could spend a lot more time on this and I could apply layer after layer to really rejuvenate these shoes with this property of shoe cream but as I say today this you know I really want to show you the mirror shine and this is just the sort of precursor to that so I'm not going to spend a huge amount of time on that so now we apply the brush yet again the product has been on for just a moment or two as you can see but again you know I'm in a hot room the the leather was very receptive to the material and it's already dried into a matte finish on top of the leather I can see that it is ready to be taken off so I'm going to take my brush and again using good strong strokes I'm going to apply the brush to the shoe to make sure that all of the bits of that shoe cream which haven't been absorbed into the leather are now going to be you know forced into the leather by the heat which is generated by the brush being applied to it and also the friction of the bristles of this 100% horsehair brush which incidentally is inside a must as far as I'm concerned when it comes to shoe care and if you've seen any of my other videos you don't have to spend a fortune on these you know this was 15 quid I think from a cobblers in London and I've had it for years and years I expect to have it possibly to the end of my life with a bit of luck so it's an investment in the future when you buy good stuff now already I don't know if you can see catch the light but this pair of shoes that was actually rather dull initially no has a nice shine beginning to form on it and it's starting to look like you know it's I could actually wear these out no I could he's out no and I'm not saying you know they would look fantastic but they would look a lot better than the majority of people who pass in the street who do not spend a lot of time looking after their Footwear now the next stage because we're moving along swifty will be the Sofia modality or normal wax polish now many people think of wax polish as what they'll normally use and only what they applied to their shoes but actually for sort of shoe care aficionados you will know that the wax polish comes after shoe cream in the process so in this case I'm going to apply an all-over layer of that wax polish to this pair of shoes to protect it all over and then we're going to start to form that all-important layer after layer on the toe cap which is basically how we acquire that mirror shine so all I'm doing now just using that polish it goes a long way actually all you need to do is pretty much tap your fingers in it to get a bit on your fingers move it around the shoe massage it in get around all those contours quite easy on a cap toe Oxford because there are not many obstacles for you in the application of the Polish of course if you were polishing a pair of brogues then you've got you know many little sort of the broguing the holes in the shoe which will make it a bit more difficult but then again you know it's also mountable all you do is you apply it carefully and then you make sure that all comes off when you brush it so once again that's it simple as that trying to show how easy it is to apply a mirror shine tissues as well this is not some sort of rocket science or black arts it's a very simple process of building up layers of polish over your shoe now when he applied one layer here and as you can see it took me just a moment or two to do that again with the other products same as those we've just winked for that application to dry and you can tell it's dry because it sort of goes a misty you know it's not wet it's a misty dried again our good friend a brush apply the brush liberally all over the shoe building up friction and heat in the process that's why it's easier to do if you've got a good quality brush and there we go already the shoe is now starting to shine it's starting to shine not only is it starting to shine but importantly for somebody who spends money on these shoes the shoe is protected it's gonna be able now to repel water when you walk down the street in the winter particularly in this country you know where there's where this salt on the roads to aid road users you know you're now not gonna have damage to your shoe because there is that layer of protection that wax layer between the shoe and the outside environment now I hope you can see there's a shine forming on this toe cap on this shoe already and we've treated the whole shoe the shame I'm done nothing to the soul not going to polish that today but the shoe know is ready to acquire a mirror shine now in this instance I'm going to apply a mirror shine to the toe cap and only the toe cap some people you know like they often hear of them doing it on the rear quarters of the shoe as well but for me the toe cap only that's important because you can't build up a mirror shine on any part of the shoe where the leather will flex because the mirror shine is not malleable it will need to be a solid piece of the leather so that's how we're going to do that right let's get ready for that phase so now it's time for us to apply that final mirror shine the bit that'll make the shoe pop the bit that'll make us stand out from the hood as somebody who looks after our appearance and you know in all walks of life there are people who who can do that others who don't now to do that I'm going to use this and Safiya modality or mirror gloss this is a product feel around or garden or five or six years I guess and it's a product they brought out specifically to aid people who wanted to get that mirror shine now you can apply and basically how it works it's quite a dry polish and it's got different waxes and oils and such in it I imagine but what it does it allows you to build up the mirror shine now to get the mirror shine you need to understand how that thing works so basically you've got the leather it's a natural product we can see the pores in the leather and it's you know if we were to zoom in on it you can see that's an underlay servus it's not entirely smooth now to get that shine we need to fill in all those Atlin deletions all those little pores and things like that with polish once we fill them in by applying layer after layer tiny bit after tiny bit then what we do is we go over it and we bring it to a fine shine just by buffing it over with you know in this case I'm going to use this cosmetic Pat some people will use prefer to use a cloth other people you know some I know some people actually use their fingers for me the cosmetic pad is the way to go now this is quite right so to aid us in this mission to bring it up to a standard to apply the Polish and to polish it out what we need to do what I'm going to do is to apply some simple h2o water in the first instance I'm just going to apply some water to my pad not so much that the pad is wet or anything like that not sopping wet all it is is slightly damp I'm going to fold the pad into a nice comfortable sort of pad as you can see there and I'm just gonna get on to my mirror gloss I'm gonna get a good bit onto the end of my pad whoops it's falling out there I'm gonna get a bit onto the end of my pad I think and see how dry it is and then I'm just going to apply it onto the toe cap and apply it and of course this pair of shoes other than what you see me apply today it has never had any product applied to it before never ever not only that but it's been in my garage attic various other storage positions in my life for the last 23 years so this is probably a very good you know blank canvas to show how to apply the mirror shine now it can be very disheartening at the early stages because all it seems we're doing is applying that polish and nothing seems to happen it just doesn't seem to make a difference whatsoever all you're doing is just you know applying polish and nothing happens and there we go nothing seems to have changed at all with that first application but what we've got to understand is this is a marathon not a sprint and the application of layer after layer after layer of shoe polish is what builds it up three four five six layers not uncommon until we start to see a bit of shine forming the more we put on the more it will speed up the process so here we are folks I've now put about five or six layers on and it's starting to fill in those gaps and we're starting to get a bit of a sheen coming through between the layers and I'm not bringing it up to a fine shine between each layer all I'm seeking to achieve at this point is to get the layers on and you know it's it's a fairly straightforward process and it takes time but to be honest it's quite satisfying it's not difficult and it's one of those tasks which I actually quite enjoy doing because you know that the tomb is cathartic isn't it you know it kind of it's mindless you can do it you can let your mind wander it's a lot easier than you know going up for a run and letting your mind wander this is one of those things you can do on a Sunday afternoon or wet day when you're you sort of want to get your thoughts together you can sit down and just play one getting your shoes in fantastic shine and not only you know is it a nice thing to do but actually for the time that you've invested you get a wonderful finish to your shoes which you know when you start going out with a fair pair of finely polished shoes on and you start to get those compliments that people will give you quite quickly they'll say you know look at this did you get such a great shine on your shoes or who shine who shines your shoes for you then before you know it you know you become known as the shiny shoe guy which is a lot better than being known as the dirty shoe guy so when I'm applying the polish as you can see I'm not messing around I'm not letting it dry to any great degree because I'm applying it rather slowly and the Polish is drying in the application so I'm just putting her on layer after layer and I'm just bringing it up to a mild shine and then I'm applying another layer because what I'm trying to do here is get the layers onto the onto the surface of this leather building them up to allow me when I'm ready which won't be too far off actually and I've only been doing this for you know six minutes or so I've been keeping an eye on the time when I'm ready when I've got enough layers down I will be doing my final buff and then you know the shoe is effectively mirror shined and ready to go out onto the streets to impress people that we meet or for that special occasion you know when you go to your you know your brother or sisters wedding or you can't married yourself whatever the situation may be or you just want to make that fantastic first impression at an important event like a job interview or a promotion interview within your job or you know you're meeting somebody important for the first time and you just want to portray to them you know that you are somebody who has taken the effort to look their very best for this special occasion this meeting whatever it may be so I'm just going to keep putting a few more layers on [Applause] okay right so here we are now I've applied about six or seven layers and looking at my watch I've been going at it for nine minutes so I consciously been aware of the time now I've got a lovely mirror shine beginning to form on this pair of shoes and in fact you know with the mirror gloss I could walk away now and it would look largely better than everybody else in town what I'm going to do what I found works best for me when I'm applying the mirror shine to my shoes is know that I've applied the mirror gloss I like to finish off with one application same sort of principle using the pad I'm just going to get a clean bit of the pad which hasn't got any miracles on it I'm just going to get a little bit of the pad turn it over get myself a little water the pad again just like that and now I'm going to apply a fine layer of the normal Madhavi or wax polish over that those many layers of the mirror gloss because what I find the mirror glass is very dry as I say that's how it builds up these layers faster and quicker than it would be if I was using this stuff alone but I find that its finish is slightly different it's not quite as deep in shine as when you apply the standard modality or wax polish so what I'm gonna do I'm just gonna refresh the sort of water on the end of my pad there one little spritz that's all I'm just gonna take a small layer no more than that of the modality or wax polish and now I'm going to apply that over the layers of mirror shine which I've already placed on the shoe now the reason I'm doing this as I say is because the modality or wax polish I believe has got you know different solvents within it to allow the wax to stay lubricated and to stay moist really because you know the the enemy of Polish really is dehydration when it dries out it's of little use to anybody but when you apply that Madhavi or polish over the top of the mirror gloss I find that it just I don't know what it does the chemical reaction the melting the solvents they get to work and they just bring up a deeper shine within the mirror gloss then is just possible with the miracles on its own so if you want to get that last sort of last layer of fantastic mirror shine all I'm doing now is going over the the layers and layers of mirror gloss with that one little layer it doesn't take very long at all and we will have a beautiful shine to our shoe hopefully I can see it it's actually come up rather well as I say this is a pair of shoes which hadn't seen any product at all in 25 years been stuck in an attic and you know if anything this is a perfect pair of shoes to show you how to apply that fantastic mirror shine actually it's wood rather well on this pair I have to say now you might find it disheartening when you're applying the layer after layer but if you do it you know like I just done it's taking me no more than 10 minutes of layering that over and over again not hanging around between applications just getting straight on put another layer on another layer on another layer on and before you know it you know you've got a wonderful shiny pair of shoes and there we go actually that took me 12 minutes from the first application of the mirror gloss now I'm at the point where I have applied the mirror gloss to my satisfaction I finished off with a layer of the Madadi or normal shoe cream my shoe is finished it is ready and I would be more than happy to wear that at any occasion you can see hopefully that this the toe cap is absolutely gleaming shining to a wonderful degree and that has taken you know minutes now appreciate there's two shoes in every pair and you need to do this again to the other pair but if you put aside say 45 minutes you will have a spectacular shine to your shoes now bearing in mind these shoes had never been treated with anything so you saw me taking them from the very you know early stages of having nothing so I've conditioned them I've applied shoe cream I've applied one layer of all-over shoe wax and then I concentrated on a mirror shine which I was able to achieve on this pair of shoes in a relatively short period of time of 12 minutes on that shoe toe cap taking it from nothing to that and now I'd be quite happy to wear this on parade or wear it to any event where I would be desirous of making an initial first impression there was anything I didn't do anything to the other shoe so we've got the ideal comparison here and hopefully you can see the difference I might put some photographs in some natural light at the end so you can see the real difference there but you know there is no comparison one is dull its drab it's not going to impress anybody the other is sparkling it's glimmering it's shiny it says the person wearing these shoes has gone the extra mile they have prepared these shoes they've looked after them they've presented them in such a way today that it shows that they care about themselves and they care about making an impression and that's what makes a difference when we are applying for a job an interview or whatever look at that yeah [Music] well I hope you enjoyed that journey with that particular pair of shoes and you can see the value that comes to you know the improvement to a pair of shoes if you spend a bit of time invest that effort and you can end up with a spectacular finish to a pair of shoes which can't be replicated in any other way and I think that's why people appreciate and respect somebody who's got a mirror shine on their shoes because they know the only way you can have acquired that is by putting the time and the effort in to get that shine so well worth applying to those shoes that you're gonna wear on those special occasions or where you want to present yourself in the best possible light so if you're going for a job interview if you're going to you know meet the prime minister or the Queen or whatever your situation where you are you know it's going to be the smartest occasions or if you're just a generally dapper chap you know and you want to maintain that shine going forwards you can wear them every day it's not that difficult to maintain once you put that shine on so I hope you've enjoyed this video today and you've learned something if nothing else if you have please don't forget to click the like button because I'd like to know that you're enjoying what I put out there and if you want to support the channel click that subscribe function as well that way you won't miss anything that we put out in the future and there'll be more shoe care products coming out in the future too also if you've got any good ideas yourself about shoe care or if you take an adverse vu to anything which I've spoken about today let me know in the comments below it's a two-way conversation I love to engage with the people who watch this video so please don't be shy leave a message for me and I look forward to seeing you in the next video until then please take care and look chapped [Music] you [Music]

Channel: The Chap's Guide

Views: 19,443

Keywords: mirror shoe shine, shoe shine, shoe shine tutorial, spit shine, shoe polish, mirror shoe shine tutorial, bulled shoes, how to shine shoes, mirror shine, kirby allison, loake shoes, mens fashion, how to, easy guide to a mirror shoe shine, easy mirror shine, guide to mirror shine, spit shine boots

Id: _M9LFm3Orj0

Length: 32min 58sec (1978 seconds)

Published: Sat Feb 22 2020