The advent of cheap imported shoes in the late ?80s booted out Glenmore from the local market, until the founder?s grandson put up a nostalgia website on it. Today, young people are discovering the comfort of walking in an older generation?s handmade shoes.

MUSIC and shoes have always gone together ? the twin signifiers of identity.

To look seriously isputing (dressed up) in the Fifties, you either wore wingtips and listened to Frank Sinatra, or crepe-soled suede loafers and listened to Elvis.

Beatle boots were de rigueur for Beatlemaniacs in the early Sixties. Later in the decade, the flower children traipsed to Woodstock in their Indian moccasins or Jesus sandals to listen to the Jefferson Airplane and Santana.

The Seventies offered a bewildering variety of options. You could wear boots ? biker or cowboy ? and listen to the Allman Brothers or Eric Clapton. Or you could go glam rock or disco pimp ? Bowie or boogie ? and elevate yourself with four-inch platform shoes.

In the Eighties, you could punk it up with a set of ?brothel creepers? ? Elvis? blue suede shoes blown up to cartoon proportions ? unless you were a Sperry topsider-wearing preppie or doing aerobics in your Reeboks to Kenny Loggins singing ?Footloose.?

Nineties girls and boys went for pole climber boots and ?alternative rock.?

Nowadays, of course, you can get any or all of the above at the mall ? though mostly people just wear rubber shoes.

Before the hegemony of mass produced footwear, however, the mark of distinction was to go bespoke, and in Manila that usually meant going to Glenmore Shoes.

Juan Aquino Santos started out as a shoemaker plying his trade on the streets of Manila, but he had the craftsman?s pride in his work that set him apart from the run-of-the-mill sapateros (shoemakers). Soon enough, customers were beating a path to his door with requests for custom-made shoes. In 1960, he finally opened the first Glenmore Shoes outlet on Claro M. Recto Ave. in Manila, taking the name from his favorite tipple ? Don Juan was apparently a bourbon man.

The advent of Beatlemania proved to be just the push that the business needed to grow. Everyone wanted a pair of the Chelsea boots that the Fab Four wore in their early days, and Santos obliged. Soon every kid on the block was sporting a pair of pointy-toed Glenmore ?Beatle boots.? The marque has had a close relationship with pop culture ever since.

The Seventies were Glenmore?s boom years. They filled the yawning gap between Marikina-made shoes and pricey imports such as Bally and Florsheim. At its peak, Glenmore had as many as 16 branches extending as far as Olongapo City and Baguio. An army of craftsmen worked on an average of a hundred orders a day, each one made to measure to the customer?s individual feet. Movie stars like Dolphy and rock stars like the Juan de la Cruz Band wore Glenmore shoes, as did athletes, many of whom had a hard time finding extra-large sizes in regular shoe stores. There was even a Glenmore-sponsored basketball team in the PBA.

The advent of cheap, imported shoes in the late 1980s marked the beginning of Glenmore?s decline. The business saw its market share dwindle as the demand for custom-made shoes fell. Finally, not long after its founder?s death, the last Glenmore Shoes branch in Rustan?s Cubao closed down.

For nearly 10 years, Glenmore was nothing more than a nostalgic memory for its aging clientele.

That is, until late last year, when Glenmore quietly reopened a small store in Metrowalk in Pasig City.

?We want to keep the tradition of hand-crafted, custom-made shoes alive,? says Adam Glen Santos, at 31 the youngest of the original founder?s grandchildren.

Adam had put up a website, largely to keep the memory of the brand alive. But e-mail started coming in from old customers ?many of them now based abroad ? filled with fond recollections. Many of them, he noted, were still wearing their original, decades-old Glenmores. Convinced that there was a significant niche market for bespoke shoes even in the age of cheap, mass-produced, imported footwear, Adam and his wife Rachel eventually scraped together enough money from their call-center jobs to restart Glenmore Shoes.

?We?re starting from scratch,? he says. Well, not really. Luckily, the family still had the original tooling equipment, hundreds of the original lasts, and a handful of surviving craftsmen who still know how to work with fine leather. There were also four decades? worth of experience and designs to draw from.

?We?re trying to recapture the older market and introduce the brand to the new generation,? says Adam. ?There are people who still appreciate the craftsmanship and the know-how that goes into a pair of custom-made shoes. It?s the experience, not just the product that we?re offering.?

It?s a novelty for younger customers who have never had shoes pasadya (custom made) before.

The first step is to get your feet measured for a custom fit. You then select a design from Glenmore?s catalog: everything from classic dress shoes, to all kinds of boots, sandals, moccasins, pumps, clogs, and more. You can then choose from a wide variety of leather, including such exotica as snakeskin, ostrich or alligator, as well as the more common cowhide, suede or nubuck. Then it?s options and more options: rounded or square toe? Buckles or laces? Flat or high heels?

It takes an average of 10 working days to have your shoes made ?another novelty for kids used to instant gratification. But in the end, bespoke fans agree, it?s well worth the wait. What you get is a unique, one-of-a-kind pair of shoes, made for your feet and your feet alone. ?

Glenmore Shoes is at 19-G, 2nd Floor, Metrowalk Commercial Complex, Meralco Avenue, Barangay Ugong, Pasig City. Telephone: 409-8690 Mobile: 0908-491-8790. Check out www.glenmoreshoes.com or email info@glenmoreshoes.com