Semi Custom Bont Boots: The Fit Fix Most Skaters Have Never Heard Of

Written for OurSkates. Reviewed and verified by Vincent Henry, 50x British National Champion and FISS Level 3 coach. Last updated July 2026.

Between a stock boot that has never quite fitted and a full custom you cannot justify sits an option most skaters have never heard of: the semi custom. It is a standard Bont boot, built to order with targeted changes for your foot.

What it fixes

One foot longer or wider than the other. Narrow ankles. Narrow feet, wide feet, half sizes. A slightly unusual foot shape. A preferred boot height, or specific frame mounting positions.

How the fixes work

For wide feet, the last, the foot-shaped form the boot is built around, is built up to add width, and a tracing of your foot makes this far more accurate. For narrow feet, the trick runs the other way: a smaller last is extended to your correct length, so a foot that is size 10 long but size 8 wide gets a boot built on an 8 last stretched to 10. Narrow ankles show themselves when the sides of the boot meet before the fit turns firm; the semi custom answer is cutting back the top line so the sides never touch, or padding the tongue on an existing boot. Shapes beyond these fixes are usually a case for full custom.

The commitments

Narrow, wide and double wide fittings take 6 to 8 weeks, made to order and never stocked. Semi custom and full custom orders involving moulding run 10 to 12 weeks, plus up to 2 more if the factory has a holiday scheduled. These boots are made for one person, so in most cases they cannot be returned, and no order can be changed or cancelled more than 72 hours after placing it, because by then it is in production.

A speed boot only works when it fits like a second skin, and a surprising number of problems skaters blame on themselves are just boots that never fitted. If any of the feet above sound like yours, contact us before you order anything, and if you are weighing semi against full custom, read Do I Need Custom Boots next.