When is a Shoe Tree too big?

Thread started in 2009

Few things I would like to add. Leather is not dough. Which means you can't just stretch leather as much you would or wouldn't like. When you walk in your shoes it puts a lot of pressure on the leather and as you wear/walk more in your shoes they stretch. Once the leather stretch to its limit then it will no longer stretch. So regardless if you have larger shoe trees or not as you use your shoes they will stretch to its max sooner or later. If you go to a cobbler shop they will tell you could only successfully stretch your shoes width by 1/2 size. I have a pair of shoes in 8D width and I have been trying to stretch them to EEE. This pair I always leave with 1 size bigger shoe tree. After 1 year of using bigger shoe trees and also over 30 wear they are only 8E. So here is my conclusion.

Hi, i bought a pair of cedar shoe trees recently but i found that the rear fitting of the left shoe tree seems a bit weird. (It's the right shoe in the picture below). So should i be bothered? Or should i sand the rear part to make it smaller? Thank you.

I don't know what people are thinking on this thread about this place. You have shared a good shape and option for shoes I have thought to buy exact shoes

Hi guys, I'm new to the forum and decided to sign up for an account in order to post a question about shoe tree sizes.

Already read through this thread here and would like to post my own question.

I recently got myself a new pair of brown shoes, size 25.5cm (size measurements as used in Japan where I currently reside). So I got myself a pair of shoe trees from the local shoe store to go with it. The brand is called Marken and is apparently American. The shoe trees are made of cedar and are these ones that split in two with a small strap at the heel to pull them out. The shoe tree size I got was for 24-25.5 cm, which falls just inside my range. I looked at larger sizes but those were 26.5 cm and above so I didn't get them.

Anyway, as I placed the shoe trees in the shoes I noticed they didn't really encompass the entire inside of the shoe, which made me wonder if the shoe trees are really effectice enough this way. Please have a look at the pictures I took to get a better idea.







As you can see, there seems to be a little gap between the shoe trees and the inside of the shoe. If this is OK size wise then I will just leave them as is. But if not, I'm going to have to change them. I just don't want to get shoe trees that are too long in length. I have some shoe trees with springs on them as you can see from the third picture, but I'm not sure if those are good for the shoe.



lullemans72 said:

Anyway, as I placed the shoe trees in the shoes I noticed they didn't really encompass the entire inside of the shoe, which made me wonder if the shoe trees are really effectice enough this way.

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Few trees will encompass the entire inside of the shoe, save perhaps a few expensive, custom designed trees, matched to their shoes. Maybe.

In practice - as opposed to in theory - your shoe trees are fine and effective. Don't worry about it.

12345Michael54321 said:

Few trees will encompass the entire inside of the shoe, save perhaps a few expensive, custom designed trees, matched to their shoes. Maybe.

In practice - as opposed to in theory - your shoe trees are fine and effective. Don't worry about it.

Click to expand...

Hi,and thanks for the quick reply.

I see. I thought the shoe's shape nor the creases would be maintained as well with my current shoe trees, but if you say so I will take your word for it.

I paid about 190 USD (converted from JPY) for the shoes by the way, so while they're not top range, they aren't of the cheapest variety either.

Star said:

The lady who served me suggested a larger size where she really had to use elbow grease to get the thing into the shoe and on the right shoe she couldn't get the back part to slide into the back of the shoe and instead allowed it to hang out.

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Hi Star, I sell shoe trees, and I can qualify that what the lady said is correct, they should be tight. But she's selling stuffed turkeys in Easter if she needs to convince you that elbow grease is required to insert them. If the tree is not made in the U.S., it's most likely from China and most likely made for a European audience. This causes obvious problems when a re-seller is trying to marry up the European sizes with US/UK sizes - seldom a perfect fit.