Victoria: Spanish trainers, men's and women's

Who Victoria are

In 1915, in a small village in La Rioja in northern Spain, a man called Gregorio had the idea of making a sneaker, and named it after his first love, his wife Victoria. The company, Calzados Victoria, marked 110 years in 2025.

Two pieces of the history are worth knowing. In the 1950s Victoria adopted vulcanisation to improve on the traditional espadrille, and the canvas sneaker that came out of it became the symbol of a whole generation of Spanish teenagers in the 1980s. And during the post war years, when natural rubber was scarce, the company started recycling tyres to make soles, then added a strawberry scent to mask the smell of them. The strawberry scent became a trademark. The V logo has been in use since 1977.

What we stock, and a note on origin

This is where we need to be precise, because Victoria's story and Victoria's current product are not the same thing.

Victoria's heritage is the canvas plimsoll made in La Rioja, and that is genuinely made in Spain. What we stock is not that. Our range is the current leather and technical trainer line: the Smash, Bolt, Wing Evo and Root for men, the Saturno, Root Metal and Cosmos for women. These are made in China, which the product descriptions state, and they use LWG certified cowhide leather along with polyester and polyurethane.

So: a Spanish footwear house founded in 1915, making these particular trainers in China from LWG certified leather. We would rather tell you that than let you assume.

If you want the heritage canvas plimsoll, the Inglesa or the Berlin, we do not carry it.

Men's and women's, on one page

Worth flagging because the navigation does not make it obvious. This collection holds both. Men's styles in UK 7 to 12 and women's in UK 3 to 8.

The men's styles include the Smash in suede, the Bolt in nylon, the Wing Evo and the Root. The women's include the Saturno, the Root Metal and the Cosmos.

Men's Victoria is genuinely hard to find in the UK. Most retailers stock the women's and kids' lines, so if you are looking for a men's pair, this is one of the few places carrying them.

EU to UK sizes, and the overlap that catches people out

Victoria's own size guide is not available on its website, so here is the conversion from our own product data.

Women's: UK 3 is EU 36, UK 4 is EU 37, UK 5 is EU 38, UK 6 is EU 39, UK 7 is EU 40, UK 8 is EU 41. Men's: UK 7 is EU 41, UK 8 is EU 42, UK 9 is EU 43, UK 10 is EU 44, UK 11 is EU 45, UK 12 is EU 46.

Look carefully at the overlap. EU 41 is a UK 8 in the women's range and a UK 7 in the men's. If you are cross shopping between the two halves of this collection, which plenty of people do with trainers, that is exactly where the mistake happens.

On fit, we find Victoria trainers run small, so compared to Paul Smith trainers we would recommend going up a size. If you are ordering online and unsure, ring us.

Care

Our Victoria range is suede, leather and nylon rather than canvas, so the usual advice about washing plimsolls does not apply. Brush suede dry with a suede brush, use a suede protector before first wear, and keep them out of the washing machine. Nylon uppers can be wiped with a damp cloth and mild soap.

On sustainability, Victoria runs a programme it calls Dear World and says that being environmentally friendly is not an option for the company but its way of doing things. The detail page for that programme is not available. What we can verify at product level is the LWG certified leather, stated in the product descriptions themselves.