About Us

The T.B. PHELPS Brand

Life Magazine Cover T.B. PHELPS celebrates Classic American Style. Our footwear and accessories feature the highest quality materials and craftsmanship while highlighting traditional, classic designs.

Since 1938, the Phelps name has been associated with leather products. Elsie and Bill Phelps started Phelps Leather in New York City featuring leather bags. Their innovative design of a women’s leather messenger bag was adopted by the US Army as standard issue for all women in the service. Today, Thomas Phelps Bates, grand-nephew, has 35 years making quality leather products and continues the same attention to innovation, design and quality with our T.B. PHELPS footwear and accessories line.

Our Quality: T.B.PHELPS produces leather products with skilled craftsmen using age old techniques. Our hand-sewn shoes are wet-lasted to the shoe forms and then carefully hand stitched one pair at a time. The leathers for the top and sides of each shoe are cut by cross-linking the leather fibers for a shoe that fits and wears well. Each part used to make the shoes is pattern-matched for a beautiful finished product.
Our belts are hand blocked on a 60+ year old Jacques hand-shear cutting table. There’s strict attention paid to showing the natural full grain leather while eliminating any scars and defects. Then each belt is made by incorporating over 25 different operations, mostly all controlled by hand. This ensures great quality and a beautiful product.

American Quality: At T.B.PHELPS we support both American made and global production. Our goal is to build the highest quality products utilizing as much American materials and workmanship as possible.