In these days of inter-generational friction, of resistance to do anything about the climate crisis, or of voting in seismic changes to an economic model without considering the wishes of the young people it will affect most, or, you know, casually dismissing older folk with the phrase “OK boomer”, it’s reassuring to know there are certain things that unite us all. We were all young once, with promise in our hearts and, very probably, a pair of Dr. Martens boots on our feet.

Born, like the boomers, in the immediate aftermath of WWII, the shoe was the brainchild of Dr Klaus Märtens, a medic in the German army. On leave in 1945 and nursing a skiing injury, he came up with DMs after finding his standard-issue boots too uncomfortable for his wounded ankle. First, he played with soft leather for the uppers, then he teamed this with an air-padded sole made from old tyres. Returning to Munich shortly after Germany’s surrender, he took a salvaged cobbler’s last and built a prototype shoe, which he presented to an old schoolfriend, now a mechanical engineer, Dr Herbert Funck (or Dr Funk, as some would have you believe).

The pair went into business, using rubber discarded on Luftwaffe airfields and found they had an immediate success on their hands (and other people’s feet), although not with the demographic they’ve since become associated with. Eighty per cent of domestic sales in the company’s first decade were to housewives looking for comfortable shoes.

The brand’s role as subcultural icon has its roots in the company’s expansion into the British market. In 1959, Northamptonshire shoemaker R Griggs bought patent rights to manufacture the shoe in its Wollaston plant. R Griggs reshaped the heel, Anglicised the name, added the yellow stitching and trademarked the soles as AirWair. The first British boot, a cherry-red, eight-eyelet edition, known as style 1460, is still in production today. A three-eyelet shoe (style number 1461) followed shortly after.

While the shoes themselves famously take some time to break in, uptake of the brand was almost immediate and Dr. Martens quickly earned a following among posties, police officers and factory workers, indeed any vocation that involved being on your feet all day. (Up until their more recent switch to soft-soled sneakers and even Crocs, chances are the tireless medical staff buzzing around you in a hospital bed would’ve been wearing a pair of the good doctor’s shoes.) The boots in particular became interwoven with each new wave of British youth culture from the early 1960s onwards, first skinheads and mods, then punks and post-punks. In the early-1980s irreverent comedy series The Young Ones, Mr Alexei Sayle even sings an ode to the shoe. Embraced by the grunge scene in the 1990s, the boot went international and gained a foothold in the lucrative American market.

After a slump in the 2000s, production levels are now back up to their 1990s peak. The sure-footed shoe of countless youthquakes is back, but has brought with it new variants that broaden its appeal and promise to be easier to wear in.