Having produced technical climbing shoes in Europe forever, Lowa is now bringing their designs to the U.S. market as of 2014. Clearly, this is a company that understands how to make a shoe that fits a foot well, because the Falco Lace offers an impressively snug yet comfortable fit. The Falco Lace is soft, adding to its comfort, yet without sacrificing any performance on edges. It is  a general, comfortable shoe that could be used everywhere from sport climbs to trad routes to boulder problems. However, its relatively high price tag, and underwhelming rubber, detract from what could be an outstanding shoe.

Edging
With a great balance between softness and support, the Falco Lace was a solid edging shoe.

Smearing
The Falco Lace uses Lowa’s proprietary LC Supergrip rubber, a blend I had never tested before and found to be underwhelming. The lack of a high-quality sticky rubber really shone through on smears, which were noticeably insecure.

Pockets 
The pointy low-profile toe helped me target the dead center of most pockets.

Heel/Toe Hooking
The low volume heel with a minimum of extra rubber performed really well in most heel-hooking situations.

Cracks 
A hot spot on the outer edge of the shoe, at the joint of the pinkie toe, made crack climbing exceptionally painful, especially in thin hand sizes.

Comfort
Except for the hot spot on the shoe’s outer edge, which only really bothered me while crack climbing, the Falco is a really comfortable climbing shoe that fit my foot like a suction cup.

Value/Longevity
This seems to be a high price tag for a rather good but also rather generic shoe.