‘I am 33 years old and I am a Chartered Accountant. As I was born in Bucharest, my first choice in terms of education was The Bucharest University of Economic Studies. I confess that initially I was more attracted to study history but the years after Ceausescu’s fall were rough. So I have chosen a very lucrative profession and, to be honest, I fall in love with it every day. Living in a rich cultural environment, such as Bucharest, gave me the opportunity to open my mind. It is remarkable how many elegant gentlemen you can find in a city that, unfortunately, doesn’t have a very good image abroad.

Products from Pukimo Raivio

Kiton, grey sports jacket, size 50EU
Ralph Lauren, Black Label suit, size 52EU

And it’s a pity because the city is growing very fast into a fashionable place and has a specific diversity that you cannot find in any other Western city. I am very happy to be married with a very open-minded person. She encourages my passion every day and she is very critical on my work and that helped me a lot over the years. She is a doctor and we now expect the arrival of our first son.

The seeds of this passion [for footwear] were planted by my uncle Ioan (John) Cocea, an old-world gentleman. He worked in the Ministry of Chemistry, this is how it was called during the Ceausescu Era, and was a very dapper man. When he arrived in Bucharest after the end of WW2, the city was still a cosmopolitan place and the fashion did not have time to change into a dull communist uniform. His style was influenced by old-regime gentlemen and I guess he passed this classic style influence to me. He was a colourful spot in an otherwise grey environment characterized by the everyday pressure of the Communist Party. He had a very varied wardrobe and even now I remember his grey double-breasted suit and his polished oxford boots. His influence was very powerful and even now when I buy a pair of shoes or a jacket I think of what he might say about it.

The second Gentleman that had a significant impact on me was Radu Morariu the Manager of Maftei’s (Bucharest branch). A few years ago I entered the Maftei shop looking for a pair of long-wing brogues and I ended up leaving the shop a few weeks later with very beautiful bespoke two-tone brogues and a very good friend. From the start I was charmed by Radu’s personality and his passion for shoes. Since then, we have become good friends and I owe him a large part of my practical knowledge of shoes (we once cut in two pieces a very beautiful suede Goyser-stiched shoe; at the time it was beyond my dreams to cut a hand-made shoe just for observing the construction).

He has a vibrant personality and we have spent many evenings talking about shoes, suits or leathers. He made me aware of the fact that life is full of colours and, in the end, style has everything to do with colour. Perhaps due to the grey colours of the Communist Regime we were unable, in the years after the Revolution, to put colour into our clothes but lately there’s been a plethora of colours on Bucharest’s streets. The third gentleman is the famous Hungarian shoemaker László Vass. As a teenager, I traveled to Budapest quite a few times and it was my little guilty pleasure to visit his shop even if the prices were at the time prohibitive for me. Nevertheless, his shoes fed my dreams…

I would say that books and the Internet information are useful but in the end you must feel shoes and polish. You must make a connection between the information and real life. So, to answer your question, I gathered my knowledge from books and media and practice my skills on real shoes. And I always use every opportunity to visit local shoemakers when I travel. There is delight in seeing how shoemakers put their skills into work in Florence, London, Vienna or Budapest. Regarding shoe polishing, there is nothing in the world that could replace experience. So, the key factor is practice and practice again…

I consider myself to have, in terms of style, a British heart in an Italian body. Living in a Latin country, bright colours and light textures attract me a lot. In terms of RTW/MTO shoes, I am a great fan of British Goodyear shoes. They offer superior comfort compared to any other shoe construction method. From the start, I began by wearing different RTW shoes. After a while, as I passed into MTO and Bespoke, I consider that the most important part of a shoe is the invisible part — the welt. This is the shoe’s heart.

From what I have experienced, my top five shoemakers list would be: Gaziano&Girling , László Vass, Maftei (Vienna), Edward Green and Crockett&Jones. Carmina is another brand with a bright future. I have a pair of brown Carmina loafers that I wear everyday and I am very pleased with them. A few days ago, I received a pair of Vass Antiqued Brown Oxfords and I’ve fallen in love with them from the first sight — or should I say first step…

Claymoor was born as I wanted to show a look into the Men behind the brands, their stories and their dreams. It is not about the shoes, it is about the Artists who create the miracle called the Shoe. Behind every shoe there is a story. So, basically Claymoor’s List is the List of Exceptional Artists. I have been well-received so far thanks to my readers. I am not interested in having a site that’s attractive for a lot of people. I am aiming to reach the true shoe lovers, the Gentlemen who experience quality footwear and who appreciate exceptional products. I am aware that I will never have huge numbers of visitors and, frankly, I don’t want that. Like Oscar Wilde once said, “Everything popular is wrong.”

I have some interesting plans for the future. I am in discussions with a US magazine for starting as guest writer and I have just started writing for a Romanian luxury magazine. Beside this, I am trying to focus on my shoe shine service and, of course, on my job. Believe me, it is not easy to be a blogger, accountant and soon a father… Besides shoes, I like to travel a lot, ride the bike and to read.

First of all, never buy shoes expecting that the image or brand name guarantees quality. Never go for bespoke or special made-to-order shoes before precisely knowing what you want. And always remember that what is good for one gentleman could be the worst choice for the other. Shoes are made for walking, not for displaying the person’s status.  I very much like an episode of Seinfeld in which he said, “Now they show you how detergents take out bloodstains, a pretty violent image there. I think if you’ve got a T-shirt with a bloodstain all over it, maybe laundry isn’t your biggest problem. Maybe you should get rid of the body before you do the wash”. So, if you buy shoes just for the way they look and those shoes will make you crippled, perhaps personal image isn’t your biggest problem.’

http://www.claymoorslist.com/

Pictures: © Mircea Cioponea, Simion Buia, Juliano Lopes