Patent leather

[aarghhelp]

I bought a pair of patent loafers 3 years ago and wore them till they fell apart (though I have to admit they weren't very stylish or beautiful, they retained a shiny impermeability to the worst the weather could hurl at them).

I have a pair of magenta ballet flats that have done sterling service over the summer.

However, patent doesn't seem to work on bags or boots for me (sent back the stuff I ordered on line). It can look very cheap and plasticky.

Are there rules to buying and wearing patent that I am missing?

Also, someone on here once commented about how it is difficult to maintain patent. I had just been wiping the mud off the patent loafers with a tissue. They still looked ok and quite shiny after, is there more to it than that?

I have patent black "crocodile" boots and handbag and I think they look good, maybe that bit of texture from the "crocodile" effect prevents them looking plasticky. imho they look expensive! I clean the boots with a baby wipe ... I read somewhere you can get special patent "polish" but I have never seen it.

However I also bought a pair of gunmetal patent leather shoes and the coating has worn off in places (on the outside of the shoes where my toes articulate) after only a few months. I wear them direct out of the house (we have a stony earthen track to negotiate - it's mud in winter. I don't wear my boots here in winter - I keep them under my desk in the office and change into them when I arrive, so they only get carpets and proper pavements!)

Also my feet can't really "breathe" in my patent shoes in the summer and have more or less given up wearing them after I kept getting a nasty itch between my toes ...

So I am keeping patent for winter boots only.

Yep, I thought patent boots would be good as well for the winter. Boden do loads. But they just didn't look right on. People do talk on here about getting patent stuff, so it might not be that it is unfashionable per se.

I do like my ballet pumps. They have a sheen like lipgloss. However they also have some nasty crumpling at the back that has never gone.

You can buy a patent restorer in clarks its like a nail varnish they also have the cleaner for patents in there.

However, if baby wipes and damp tissues work, do I need yet more bottles of shoe care stuff from Clarks?

Also, are patent ballerinas especially in? I notice as the avid girls have been discussing them!