Herein is a list of failures, major and minor, that my prototype boots endured, and the changes I've made in my process as a result.

Lessons from Using Turnshoes as Hiking Boots

• Wet leather is very slippery on snow, ice, and wet rock,
• The life of a leather sole on trail is less than 200 miles,
• Turnshoes cannot easily be resoled,
• I wanted less of a "barefoot" experience. Ow.

Uppers

stiching abraded and broke on several occasions. The leather at both heels split at around 2500 miles. I've switched to a heavier thread, moved the front seam back away from the joint, and added a heel reinforcement.

Lacing

The punched and reinforced holes that the laces run through have almost all blown out at least once. I'm setting the holes further back from the edge and installing metal eyelets.

Insoles

The first and second solings were 3mm Vibram with no insole. This allowed too much flex and too little protection at the joint: I noticed some cracking of the insole there at 500 miles, and by 1000 miles the insole had split almost completely in two. I replaced those insoles and added a thermal cork midsole, and have had no problems.

Right v. Left

I eventually applied 12 patches to the uppers of my boots: three to the left and nine to the right. Most of those patches on the right boot were where the upper met the welt/insole. It turns out that I performed an unintentional experiment: On the right boot the welt was stitched in 3/8" from the edge of the insole, on the left it was 3/16".