Browsing all articles tagged with Keen

Jan

Freshly baked Keen

It’s that time of year when the brands come a calling and we get a sneak peak in to what they have coming up for Autumn / Winter 2012. Today it was the turn of the lovely Jilly from Keen who usually brings us cake, but in true new year style brought apples. For the record Jilly, it’s cake all the way please for the Webtogs crew…..

Two things caught our eye, first up, the Brice, an urban trekking boot and shoe. It looks different with no heel break giving you whole sole traction. It’s got the traditional Keen dry waterproof layer but with an additional perforated foam section around the membrane to pump out hot air.

These are pretty multipurpose, we can see ourselves heading out and about in town and straight on to some tracks in these, and the colours are fab. We’re loving the green in particular. £110 for the boots £105 for the shoes

Next up the return of a favourite with the KeenKlamath coming back on the scene. Good torsion control, external heel support, quality leather on the outside, it looks traditional but with a modern twist. Great for hills in the UK where keeping the elements out is the all important part.

Now, when’s Autumn due again?

Feb

New Keen for Winter

Gareth

Footwear

Keen, winter

We were super chuffed to get the lovely Gillian in from Keen recently, firstly because she is so cool she brings us cake to eat each visit (yum yum), but also because this time she brought in loads of lovely new Keen for us to look at for Winter 2011!

Keen have always been associated as a summer brand but we were seriously impressed by the attention to detail they have made on their Winter products this year. We’re not going to go through everything, but there are a couple of items that have really tweaked our interest. First up, the return of a favourite we have not seen for a couple of years, the Summit County. When the weather outside makes the UK look like a scene from a winter wonderland, these boots are going to keep your toes rather warm.

We really like the 350g of insulation just for the toes with the rest spread elsewhere, as it’s the toes that usually get the coldest. The insulation features Keen’s legendary attention to the environment, being made from charcoal and babmboo. The Summits use Keen’s Dual Climate Rubber on the soles, this is a technology where the sole of the shoes or boots harden in the cold weather to get better grip in the snow and ice, and soften when you go inside or get warmer weather for improved stickiness.

Next up are the Gypsum’s, some rather impressive shoes and boots that are designed as winter Targhee replacements. The main difference is that the sides of the soles are not rounded, giving a larger surface area for grip and more oomph when digging in to mud, snow or ice. You also have a moulded heel cup which gives a more positive action gripping the back of your foot. Below you can see men’s and women’s versions of the mid boots.

The Gypsum’s also feature the Keen Zorb Strobel, an addition to the footbed that gives an extra spring, the zorb referring to the yellow bouncy patch you see below, and the strobel to the type of stitching you see around it.

Keen have also addressed some of the feedback that their shoes can run a little hot, and you now have ventilation holes that run up through the tongue, that pump out the hot air from the bottom of the boot.

If the Gypsum isn’t winter orientated enough for you though, then the Revels definitely will be. Starting at the bottom, they have a sole with a unique patent pending on them. What Keen have done is to mould their soles on the treads you find on snow tyres to give fantastic grip in snow, slush and mud. They have also nabbed their own technology that they use for their waterproof sandals, with razor siping added to the tread on the bottom, this gives improved grip by displacing water.

If this wasn’t enough technology, they then went and re-designed the mid sole unit with a new footbed called the Trapelator. Ignore the fact it sounds like an 80′s action movie hero, The Trapelator gives you a serious blast of warmth in your feet with some cool use of technology. You have a reflective heat shield that faces down to the ground bouncing the cold away, a honeycomb loft layer to trap air, insulate and a wool felt layer for comfort and to build up instant warmth as soon as you put the boots on.

So far we have just looked at the Trailhead offerings from Keen, but Lucy also made me take photos of the Clara as well……. can’t really think of much to say on it except that Lucy loves the look of them!

Jun

Save up to 28% with Webtogs

Gareth

General Outdoor Tags

Keen, merrell, north face, sale

Not sure what’s going on with Keith our buyer, but having just got back from doing the GR20 we think walking at altitude has impacted his brain a little….. as a result he’s slashed some prices.

Save 10% on Keen

Save 15% on Merrell

Save 20% on The North Face

These deals can’t last forever, so head over to www.webtogs.co.uk and grab a Summer Bargain!

Mar

Power Ranger love Keen

Gareth

Clothing, Gareth Tags

Gareth, Keen, power rangers

One of our favourite brands over the last couple of years has been Keen, the American outdoor footwear brand. We love them so much, you can usually see at least 2 or 3 of us wearing them each day in the office and warehouse. They are also the only brand we actually back up with a special Keen comfort guarantee

Apparently though we are not the only ones to have heard how special they are, and alledgedly, those crazy Power Rangers dig them too. We finally received photographic evidence however this week…..

Jul

Newport H2′s reviewed in Motor Boat & Yachting

Gareth

Clothing, Gareth, General Outdoor Tags

Gareth, Keen, Motor Boat & Yachting, Newport H2's

We’ve just got a sneak peak from our friends at Motor Boat and Yachting about a review they have done on the Keen Newport H2′s. It’s coming out in next month’s magazine but Dave Marsh their technical editor has kindly sent us across an advance copy.

As a boater, I normally hate sandals. They often feel flimsy and unsupportive, and their soles rarely grip well. Most crucially of all, exposed toes are a liability on a boat. A single clumsy contact with a deck cleat can render you immobile for ages. Designed by an American sailor, Martin Keen, specifically for boating, I bought these Newport H2 sandals from Webtogs for one reason only; because the toe protection looked so sturdy. In practice, they’ve excelled in every area.

The sturdy toe caps are great, you won’t suffer even if you slam into a sharp metal object. They are ridiculously comfortable, at least on my feet . From new, I wore them for two days without a break, with and without socks. These broad H2’s would obviously suit wide feet, yet thanks to the soft stretchy lining (Keen call it ‘hydrophobic mesh’, I’d call it neoprene) and the bungee-like laces, they feel uncommonly supportive on my standard issue perambulators too. Despite this good support and the snug ankle strap, they are very easy to flick off. All told, I’ve never owned sandals as comfortable.

Good grip is paramount on a boat. I tested these on a teak laid deck, and a diamond pattern glassfibre deck, in the dry and the wet. Keen’s non-marking sole (it deserves this description) is much harder than on any deck shoe I’ve encountered. Most noticeable was that its wet weather grip generally seemed almost as good as its grip in the dry. On the teak, in the wet, it was possible to force the H2s to slide along the grain. But across the grain and the rubber sealant strips, with my weight pressing down, the H2s wouldn’t budge at all. Their lateral grip was excellent too, as was their resistance to twisting. On the wooden pontoons, and on surfaces ashore like concrete, tarmac, carpet and flagstones, my H2s were as grippy as anything I’ve ever worn.

Other useful features: H2s can be machine washed, they seem very sturdily constructed, replacement laces are available, they come in half sizes and three different colours, there’s a no quibble 60 day return policy, and the people at webtogs could not be more helpful. One thing to note. The open pattern on the H2’s soles tends to pick up and hold small stones, between 1mm/5mm diameter. So if you’re returning from the beach, check your soles before you hop back onboard. They dry out quicker than thick leather deck shoes, but unsurprisingly, nowhere as fast as all-plastic Crocs.

Mine are only two months old, so I can’t comment on their longevity yet. You might struggle to get into the Royal Yacht Squadron wearing sandals, but otherwise I can’t recommend these too highly. For day-to-day boating, I’d take these in preference to most deck shoes.

Apr

Dead keen on Keen

Gareth

Footwear, Gareth, General Outdoor Tags

Gareth, Keen, webtogs

Over at Webtogs HQ, we all love KEEN. I’m just looking around right now and 4 people in the office have them all on! Although they are a major US brand, they’re still scrappy newcomers in the UK. With this in mind, we wanted to do something a little different and from this week we are offering a 30 day comfort guarantee.

So How does it work I here you ask? Well if you buy a pair of Keen shoes, sandals or boots from Webtogs and you don’t think they are the most comfortable shoes you have ever had, we give you 30 days from the date they arrive with you to send them back to us. The key difference – you can send them back having used them. Yup, you read that right! As soon as we get them back, we’ll refund your payment card for the full purchase price you paid. We don’t, however, refund any delivery charges, or the carbon offset if you elected to pay it.

The catch is….well……there honestly isn’t one! The only thing you need to do is make sure they are clean when you send them back to us. We’re not talking brand new clean, but they do need to be free of any loose soil / mud / sand / other things!. This is actually a health & safety requirement and not us being afraid of a bit of dirt! One other thing, you can only use this guarantee once. This is an addition to our current returns policy. All of the normal ZERO hassle features you know and love are totally unaffected by this guarantee.

We don’t offer this guarantee on any other brand of footwear (or anything else, for that matter). It’s not that we don’t love our other brands, but they are all well established in the UK. We’re on a mission to spread the KEEN message as far and wide as we can. We hope that this extra guarantee will convince a few more people to try KEEN for the first time. If they’re like our current KEEN customers, we won’t be seeing too many returns! The full details of the guarantee are here and all our keen products can be viewed here.