How to Maintain Your Shoes: Best Tips

To the infinite number of sneaker heads that have emerged since Air Jordans hit the ‘90s, our joyful pride of footwear has not only become an extension of our style and trending movement of fashion, but also a parade of our status and biblical ornament of home decoration. 

Malaysians are totally smitten by the sneaker movement and the love doesn’t seem to be wearing out, unlike some finicky fashionistas. Let’s learn how you can keep your love (sneakers, that is) alive or at least prolong them. 

Here are some quick tips on how to store and preserve your precious sneaker collection. 

1. Keep Your Shoes Fresh 

Store your shoes in clear display boxes, instead of keeping them in the cardboard boxes they come with, since cardboard erodes more quickly. Displaying them in clear display boxes lengthens the boxes’ lifespan and helps you quickly pick out your shoes, rather than opening each box to locate the pair that fits your mood. 

2. Clean Your Shoes Before Putting Them Away 

Keep your kickers fresh and clean whenever you put them back into the display box. That’s because dirt and residue usually build up and becomes permanent after a good while of negligence – this will devalue the resale price of your kickers. 

Photo by Paul Volkmer on Unsplash

As the more serious sneakerheads out there know, this is a step you definitely don’t want to skip. Ensure your shoes are kept clean and fresh with mild cleaning solutions. An inexpensive way is to mix warm water with a little bit of detergent and use a soft cloth or brush to remove excess dirt or stains. Last but not least, air-dry your kickers and give them time to dry completely before putting them back in storage. 

Fun tip: The silica gel from original packaging is a great moisture absorbent agent, keeping your sneakers dry. You might want to place 1 or 2 in every box.

3. Use Shoe Inserts to Keep Your Shoes in Shape 

There are sneakerheads who are always keen on reselling or saving their stash for the annual Sneakerlah convention – the biggest place in Kuala Lumpur to trade kicks. 

One way to ensure the quality of your shoes is to keep them in shape. We’ve talked about preserving the external of your kicks (point no. 2) but maintaining the inside is just as important.

Shoe inserts are a great way to extend the lifespan of your shoes. Often times, the volatile weather in our country and other circumstances can affect the shape, size and condition of your shoes, which you’d definitely want to keep in pristine condition when reselling or trading. The best thing is that most times, shoe inserts come together with the purchase. 

Photo by David Lezcano on Unsplash

It really isn’t that hard and requires little effort to keep your kickers at tip-top condition, all it takes is a few minutes of your day! If you have more tips and tricks on preserving the aesthetics and quality of your kicks, leave a comment below!