Frye: The Boots That Made History 150 Years of Craftsmanship

A celebration of the iconic role of Frye boots in American culture and fashion, featuring a mix of archival, rock-and-roll, and celebrity photographs. In 1863 John A. Frye opened the doors of a small shop in Marlboro, Massachusetts. The shoes he made were not meant to be icons of fashion, yet somewhere along the line Frye boots became just thatthe same boots originally worn by pioneers and servicemen began to be featured in international fashion spreads. Jackie Kennedy wore them. John Lennon wore them. Rock stars and celebrities as diverse as Bruce Springsteen, Gwyneth Paltrow, Robert Pattinson, and Sam Worthington wear them today. In hundreds of images by top photographers such as Bob Gruen and Jake Chessum, as well as photographs shot specially for the book, Frye boots are seen rocked out and urbanized, accessorized and coveted, worked and roughed up, always flaunting their inimitable style and all-American cool.

Architecture and design writer Marc Kristal has written, co-authored or contributed to more than a dozen books, notably Immaterial World: Transparency in Architecture and The Great American House (with Gil Schafer III). As a journalist, Kristal has written for the New York Times, Architectural Digest, Elle Decor, Wallpaper, Interior Design, and Metropolis, among other publications, and was a contributing editor of Dwell. The Frye Company: Each generation of Frye craftsmen dedicated themselves to the art of shoemaking, creating new patterns, discovering new materials, and even inventing shoe-making machinery. The dedication to crafting footwear as functional as it is durable has been the company’s benchmark ever since. The Frye Company’s heritage is told in every stitch of every shoe made over the last 150 years: across cultural shifts and changes in fashion, for generation upon generation. Now, Frye boots are accessorized and envied on city streets, worked and roughed up on country roads, and chosen above all others for their inimitable style and uncompromising quality.