The Story Of Redback Boots

1920 The Start of an Australian Story

The Cloros family’s bootmaking story can be traced back to the 1890s. Learning the family trade, brothers Stanley, Bill and John left Greece, arriving in Australia in the early 1920s and brought their fishing trade and boot making skills to Sydney. Smart thinking and hard work set the foundation for what would become the family tradition and two famous bookmaking brands.

1925 Boots For Workers

Like many new Australians, the Cloros brothers lived off their wits and their craft. They salvaged cast-off leather from barbershop razor straps and fashioned it into shoes and boots, selling their handmade pairs at the Surry Hills markets in inner Sydney. Through the hardship of the Great Depression, demand for durable footwear only intensified. Their elastic-sided work boot, the style that would later become known around the world as the Chelsea.

1960 Utility Meets Design

The elastic sided boot found its way from worksites into popular culture. Worn by rock bands and trendsetters in London and Sydney, the Australian Chelsea boot became a symbol of both work and style.

1970 Keeping Production Local

When many manufacturers moved offshore, George Cloros made the call to keep his production in Australia, establishing the Viscount footwear brand and moving production to Wagga Wagga. "Handcrafted in Australia" took on even greater meaning. It was more than a label it was born of the earth and soul of the Riverina. His boots held a promise of quality that would not be compromised and would be carried on by his sons Matt and Mark.

1980 A New Era

Viscount established their operations once again in Sydney, taking a site in industrial inner-city St Peter’s. Then two of George’s sons, Mark and Matt, started their own business. In 1987 they acquired the North Queensland Boot Co-operative, keeping skilled bootmakers in work and building on the tradition of durable, fair priced boots started in 1912.

1989 Enter Redback

The Redback name was launched, quickly becoming a mark of Australian toughness. Artist Reg Mombassa summed it up: "I can't work without my Redback boots."

1996 Strength At Scale

Production expanded to a new site in Waterloo, lifting output to 650,000 pairs a year. Redback became the preferred boot supplier for fire brigades, police, emergency services, and steelworkers.

1998 Trusted By The ADF

In 1998, Redback secured the contract to supply the Australian Defence Force, formalising a partnership that began early on and continues today.

2000 Built in Sydney, Worn Worldwide

Nearly a century after it all began, the boot making heritage behind Redback boots was being worn worldwide. From miners in Pennsylvania to oil riggers in the Timor Sea, the boots carried the same reputation for rugged Australian durability. Redback also became the only foreign made boot supplied to the US military.

2026-Present An Australian Original

Redback boots still are made in our Sydney workshop today. The range has grown, but each boot is still hand crafted around a traditional high strength innersole by a skilled local workforce. For Matt and Mark Cloros, the first duty of care remains the same as it always was – to their workers, their craft and the boots that carry people through their lives.