What Oak Street Bootmakers is known for

Chicago bootmaker founded 2010 by George Vlagos, operating out of the Independence menswear store he also owns, and known for boots and shoes built with Horween Chromexcel leather from the Chicago tannery.

Oak Street Bootmakers was founded in 2010 in Chicago by George Vlagos, whose father immigrated from Greece and ran his own shoe-repair business. The company operates out of Independence, a Chicago menswear store also owned by Vlagos. Its signature material is Horween Chromexcel leather, sourced from the Horween Leather Company, a Chicago tannery founded in 1905 by Isadore Horween; Oak Street's finishing process is reported to run 89 separate steps over 28 days across all five floors of the Horween facility. The brand is built around classic American work- and dress-boot silhouettes made domestically rather than overseas.