Grafs Lifestyle

It may not sit in the hippest of locales, but you sit tight, this one's going to answer all your footwear needs - every one of them.

For starters, Grafs is easily one of the biggest and most sprawling footwear sellers I've ever been to in this town. Casual shoes, dress shoes, sandals, sneakers, slides, kids footwear... there's nothing you can't find here. Indeed, it's simply the sprawl of the heel.

Let's set expectations about looks first - it's a rather simple-looking store in a simpler locale. But unlike many showoffs, this one walks the talk. Adults, both men and women, can treat themselves to the multitude of varieties in all segments of footwear.

The men's section is inundated with casual shoes - a glorious range, and earthly prices that start as cheap as Rs. 300 (though they hit a high of Rs. 3,000). The same applies to men's dress shoes, which come in brands like Lotus Bawa, Lee Cooper, Woodland, Hush Puppies, Liberty, Bata and so on.

Grafs is a sneaker haven - the range here is exhaustive, voguish and economical. Nowhere else did I find such variety in sneakers, even in specialty sneaker outlets in town. There are the no-nonsense, durable local brands, some of them manufactured in-house by Grafs costing as low as Rs. 500; and then there are the usual Nikes, Reeboks, Lottos and Adidases that start at around a thousand bucks and go on until Rs. 6,000.

And guess what, there are also the soulful girlie sneakers in all those pink hues and feminine colors, available in all those marquee sneaker brands that fit the drama queens to a tee. And there's something for the active and outdoorsy, too, what with the range of trekking and camping shoes that Grafs has, most of them from Columbus and reasonably priced.

As far as ladies fashion goes, our women, young and old alike, are sure to have a feisty time shopping. There's a veritable pot-pourri of sandals - slingbacks, slides, regular ones, flip-flops and casual shoes. And they are priced to move - Rs. 300-4,000.

Teens, both the dudes and the gals, can definitely strut their stuff with the trendy array of fashion foot statements that come cost-effective. And kids can frolic in the fun shoes, sandals and flip-flops from Disney and many other renowned brands.

As if this is isn't all enough, there's a shoe care (polish, spray, shampoo etc.) collection too for different kinds of shoes, colors and leather. Afer much foraging through most of the city's footwear outlets, only here have I found the one neutral suede leather spray for the Italian Aldos I bought in Canada; to my chagrin earlier, I'd forgotten to bring the Aldo spray along with the shoes to India. This is the story of an Indian spray coming to the rescue of Italian shoes!

Grafs Lifestyle is a laidback, old-school, no-frills foot-fashion store that will make your visit worthwhile; you'd have to be on Crack to leave the store empty-handed.