I recently read the Put This On post "The Black Tie Shoe That’s Good For Something Else," in which Jesse talk about the plaintoe barmoral and other types of black shoes and their formality for occasions like black tie event.
Quote:
Many men simply wear black wingtips with their tuxedo, or worse, black loafers. Frankly, you might as well wear sneakers - only you don’t get any rebel points for wearing loafers. Black cap toes are marginally better, but still look out of place, particularly if they feature any broguing. They simply read as, “I was doing great until I got to the shoes, then I gave up."
So I assume the level of formality of black shoes goes something like this like this:
- (LEAST) loafer < wingtip < cap toe < plain-toe (MOST)
I also got intrigued by Kent Wang's description on his plaintoe balmoral as "the only shoe that can be worn with both a tuxedo and a conventional suit. Appropriate for black tie, job interviews, funerals, and everyday city wear."
I was curious where then the wholecut shoes like below fall into the rank of black-shoes-formality. Is it somewhere between the cap toe and the plain-toe, or is it even more formal than the latter?
In addition, does such black wholecut also versatile as the plain-toe, which Kent Wang describes as "appropriate for black tie, job interviews, funerals, and everyday city wear"?
Thanks
P.S. I guess there is no black shoes more formal than the court shoes aka opera pumps.
