There’s never been a more harmonious time in the relationship between streetwear and traditional menswear. Streetwear aficionados are wearing oxford shirts, menswear fanatics are wearing backpacks and everyone is wearing the simple under-designed sneaker. Gourmet are a brand who’ve risen to the top in this sector of fashion.

Started by three friends, Gourmet originally started out as a clothing company. “The [story] behind the clothing company was three Italians from the East Coast coming together to start a clothing brand, but the key ingredient to the recipe was that we were going to make all the clothing in Italy”, stated Jon Buscemi. This changed when they found that the market wasn’t quite ready for the products they’d made. “Making $400 sweatpants and $1200 sweatshirts just didn’t make sense where the market was going”.

It was only then that the company started introducing footwear into the collection, eventually morphing into a fully fledged footwear label. Gourmet are a company who wear their influences on their sleeves - sometimes to their own detriment. “Obviously Gourmet is influenced by Nike, they were doing all this first.” Jon stated in an interview with BNTL.co.uk that “When we did that Jordan flip shoe they dropped a federal lawsuit on us.”

That blip aside, the company still make shoes based on classics. For instance, their duck boot is clearly influenced by LL Bean’s version, but Gourmet’s versions is a re-interpretation as opposed to a rehash. Fabric-wise, the company uses the same leather as Louis Vuitton, making their shoes in Italy. But whilst the quality is top notch, the design is their calling card. They make clean trainers that straddle the fine line between under and over design. As Jon puts it, ‘There’s no floating space shoes here. It’s all easily digestible classic design.’

The Footpatrol Campus and the Lodger Monk shoe have many obvious similarities – both are reinterpretations of classic designs with reserved asymmetry and on-point detailing. But it wasn’t anything inherent in the shoes that made me want to put them together.

Last week, I entered the Crooked Tongues competition to win 52 pairs of trainers (still open here) and one of the questions (mercifully few in number) was “[what's your] favourite sneaker store?”

My answer had to be Footpatrol.

From 2002, 16A St Anne’s Court in Soho, London was home to the most select sneakers and footwear. And for those who knew Footpatrol, the fact that it closed back in March 2008 won’t preclude it from consideration in any list of great sneaker outlets; exceptional staff and a stream of great collaborations meant the place was without a genuine rival and truly unforgettable.

So, in remembrance of the store and with London becoming all too grey recently (which, for most people, quite wrongly connotes the dismal: old age, Man United away kit 95-96, the bland, Gordon Brown) it seems proper to match-up the Grey FP Campus 80s and the Lodger Monk shoe.

The adidas Campus, having earned its reputation from the BBoys of the eighties, was one of the most iconic sneakers of its time. The Footpatrol version has a suede upper and tonal snakeskin stripes on the inside, providing asymmetry not unlike the Lodger Monk Shoe with its buckle strap. Both shoes are clean designs with just the right amount of variation to avoid being either a corruption of a classic or insufficient to constitute actual change.

Although I started this post with the seductive idea of free sneakers it seems the shoes I really covet are now only available at a savage cost on ebay or not at all, which reminds me of, and adds validity to, a Scott Roeben quote: “Sex is like Art. Most of it is pretty bad, and the good stuff is out of your price range.”

A friend, dating a woman with the distinct look of a bunny-boiler-to-be, is relentlessly forced to celebrate petty and obscure anniversaries. I empathise; the psycho-siren and the sneaker brand share the same distasteful appetite.

Few things annoy me as much as anniversary-coercion. It’s primitive to think the relative position of the earth and sun should induce a feeling of generosity. I am fortunate to have a few people in my life that (bizarrely) want to buy me gifts, but I’d like the gift giving to come from an organic desire rather than compulsion by astronomical circumstance. The gifts are invariably better as well.

And, as a fellow shoe obsessive once said, what’s true in life is true in footwear. Celebrating its 30th anniversary, the adidas Top Ten has seen several versions released that lack the brilliance of the February 2008 “1979” version. That shoe (pictured above) has yet to be bettered.

It was a triple collaboration with Undefeated (UNDFTD) and photographer Estevan Oriol and produced a trainer that keeps on giving. Accompanied by a handsomely bound photo essay book, the sneaker has lots of precise detailing including a basketball-like upper, gold coloured lace jewels and eyelets, and a transparent sole finishing.

All of which create natural pairing with Lodger’s Desert boot (also pictured above).

Just as the Top Ten made the cross-over from sports shoe to stoop shoe, the desert boot made the inevitable move from warfare to Mayfair. A clean two piece pattern, beautifully simple lines in biscuit suede and remarkably comfortable due to its unstructured, unlined upper - the desert boot is my preferred choice for all manner of occasions.

Don’t wait for a birthday to buy a pair!

Whilst blogs are known for changing their tastes at double speed, certain cornerstones remain. Common Projects are one such brand. Their footwear is a staple for a new generation who like their trainers clean, sleek and simple. Founded in 2004, the company is headed by Flavio Girolami and Peter Poopat.

When asked about how the name came about, Peter replies, ‘We intended to do several diverse “projects” and since he’s in Italy and I’m in New York we called it Common Projects’.

The formation of Common Projects was a pleasant accident. ‘There was a hole in the market at the time for simple well made sneakers’, Peter says. They initially ‘planned on making a couple of samples to wear for the summer’ but they ended up taking them to a New York tradeshow instead. They were immediately snapped up and the rest has entered the annals of blog folklore, if such a place exists.

Made in Italy, Common Projects only use sheep nappa leather for their trainers and soon to be launched bags collection. They’ve also been experimenting with different materials, with the latest collection featuring a nylon body with a leather heel patch, vamp and toe cap. Previous versions have mixed suede and leather in a similar manner, adding a nice twist to a well established formula.

However, the main difference between these and, say, Adidas Stan Smiths is that they’re hand stitched instead of vulcanized. This gives off a much dressier feel and also means that they’ll last longer than trainers that aren’t made in such a manner.

We’ll catch up again with Mr Poopat next week for a quick chat about the materials and methods used in Common Projects products.

Why do shoe brands think people want to design footwear?

Whatever name it goes by (a Mongolian BBQ isn’t just a buffet!) the big trainer brands all have uninspiringly similar facilities that allow you to design your own shoe, something I have no desire to engage in for the following three reasons.

Firstly, it’s a lie. They don’t really let you design a shoe. No brand lets you tweak the actual design: Thinner sole? No. Lower upper? No. Put a shelltoe on a Dunk? Hell no. Nike Bespoke at 21 Mercer Street offers the most variables, with a plethora of colour and material options allowing you to customize 31 parts of the shoe. But that shoe has to be an Air Force 1.

Secondly, there’s no reason to suppose I have any talent. Being a vast consumer of a product doesn’t automatically render me a good producer of that product. I happen to eat like a Trojan with a tape worm but I cook like a pyromaniac with a flamethrower. Neither does being a good judge. It’s only the perverted few that would want to hear Simon Cowell sing.

Thirdly, I’m pretty sure there are enough shoes that are out already or soon to be dropping that I want to buy. Samba shuttlecocks, SNS Tretorns, Swaggers, Superstar 80s 3-Ways, Sauconys, Supra Skytops, Scandeezys… alliteration aside - it doesn’t end!

Maybe I’m missing the point. People like to personalise the things they own and there’s nothing wrong with that. But I would repeat Wodehouse’s sentiments: “I thought the practice was reserved for those who are in danger of forgetting their name?”