Hideous, silly looking and radically overpriced.
Unclviny
Are those supposed to be worn with skinny jeans? Because skinny jeans, especially on guys, are an abomination. And the shoes are ugly.
This. It’s kind of cool, but not at all versatile. You’d either have to use it as part of a costume, or be very clever about what you wear with it for it to work.
This! A million times this!
Perhaps it’s because we are from the same generation, but Mr. Towers here took the words and thoughts right out of my mouth and brain.
Screams “midlife crisis” to me.
When I was a teenager in the 80s I might have shed the blood of a goth to get my hands on a pair of these boots.
Now, I might shed the blood of someone wearing these boots, just, ya know, because.
Isamu is right, and right again. Those boots look like part of a costume, they don’t look like anything that anyone would wear in real life on a regular basis. I can see a teenager wanting and wearing a pair of those boots, but not anyone older than about 19, unless it’s part of a costume.
Plus, the very name of it screams “I am ANGSTY!” Come on, Darkstar? Really? We need a puking smiley here. Please feel free to imagine that I’ve used one.
Lynn Bodoni, when I hear “Darkstar” I don’t think angsty- I think Tim Bisley and his oxypheromalkahyde.
But they definitely do look costumey.
Nitpick, because the Dope wouldn’t be the same without that sort of inane minutia : this is an iron cross (or, in heraldic terms, a cross pattée). The boots’ crosses are flourished crosses.
Oh, and I wouldn’t be caught dead in them boots. Crappy color (especially for *black *boots), way too much squiggly stitchwork, and even LARPers would find the sole dragon tackier than Elton John in Hello Kitty drag.
The design looks like a hybrid of those two crosses - an iron cross, but with flourishes at the end.
Some medieval crusaders are spinning in their graves over these hideous boots.
I like them. I wouldn’t wear them (I prefer undecorated shoes for me), but I’d admire them on someone else. But then, I do run in the Goth & Steampunk circles…
Too much going on. In fact, I hate all of the boots that this designer makes. Who were his foot models? Ogres? Either the toes curl up too much, or they are so flat that I wonder how a normal man could squeeze his toes into them (Palmer boots, Ruin loafer, Gilmour driver). I certainly couldn’t.
On the other hand…these rock. And what a steal at only $295.
Jebus - are there 3" of extra toe room in every shoe?!? Those all suck!
It’d look good on Johnny Depp… but so would practically anything else. 
I would like it more if it were a bit smoother at the front, but I’ve seen much uglier.
I think that if you were provisioning your airship in your goggles and beautiful long coat, they’d be fantastic. Otherwise, you’d look like a tool.
Also, “Darkstar”? Really? Is that their AOL screen name?
Wow - I’ve gone through varous boot phases from cowby through Docs, and that is one ugly boot.
The only way to wear something like that is if you wish to costume yourself as something I can’t imagine anyone being taken seriously as.
Fugly, and the name is beyond stupid, but if I saw them in a catalog with Isamu’s write-up, I’d totally consider buying them. That write-up is pure awesome and must be rewarded.
Hideous, in an ugly sort of way.
I like them. I find myself thinking the opposite of ‘should be worn with costume’. No, if you’re going to rock those boots, you dress down with them. I think they’d look great with the right pair of jeans and the right shirt.
Of course, I’d like them in a women’s size and I’d wear them with a skirt, but that’s my major malfunction.
If a German steampunker skinned a toad to make a boot, it’d look like this. 