A page of tips, tricks and advice for those already in the corps!
Uniform
Parade Shoes
Kiwi black polish is the only black polish suggested . It is personal choice whether you use cotton wool balls or a lint free and scratch free cloth. Dab the cotton wool/cloth into a pot of warm water and apply a medium amount of polish to the cloth/cotton wool before rubbing it into the shoes in a circular motion. The whole shoe should be polished this way. Keep working the polish until the polish gets used up, keeping the cotton wool/ cloth moist. Continue doing this to bull the shoe, until you get a shiny glass like appearance. With new shoes it may be necessary to do multiple layers to get a shiny appearance
Male and female shoes are different. The male shoes have a stitched line separating the toe cap from the rest of the shoe whereas the female shoes do not have this, however you should polish the whole shoe
It is preferable to have a shoe box for your parade shoes to keep them from being damaged or scratched, or alternatively keep them in an old pair of ladies 15 denier tights, to keep them shiny.
Beret
When you get a new beret it will need moulding. To do this you will need to wet the beret, this can be done with a bowl of warm water. The beret will then need to be placed on your head and shaped so the left side is pulled down to your ear, with the beret badge pulled out so it’s flat and left to dry naturally. This will take some time. The badge on the front should be directly above your left eye, and the leather band should be roughly 2 finger widths above your eyebrows.
