Salvatore: Shoemaker of Dreams (2020) - full transcript

I love feet. They talk to me.

As I take them in my hands,
I feel their strengths,

their weaknesses,
their vitality or their failings.

A good foot, its muscles firm,
its arch strong, is a delight to touch.

A masterpiece of divine workmanship.

My desire to work with feet
was unrelenting,

and it took hold of me profoundly
when I was still a small boy

in a remote Southern Italian village,
ninety kilometers east of Naples.

You had to go to Bonito on purpose,
it wasn't along the provincial road.

You had to deviate
from the provincial road of Irpinia

to reach this small village on a hill,



where time had stood still,
it was an archaic world.

I was born in this house in 1898,
the eleventh child of fourteen.

Three of my siblings died in childhood,
including the first Salvatore.

I inherited his name.

My father Antonio
and my mother Mariantonia were farmers,

with joint properties
each of about ten acres.

Our meager income came
from the proceeds of our crops:

wine from the vines,
wheat and corn from the fields,

oil from the olives.

Bonito was a cul-de-sac, a dead end.

To get ahead, one had to leave.

One by one, my elder brothers
and sisters left for the United States,

sending back their earnings
to help keep up the farm,

where I remained with my brother Elio,



my two younger sisters,
my father and my mother.

Luigi Festa had his shoe shop
in front of our house.

I'd sneak in, perch myself on a chair,

and stare at his fingers
working on the shoes.

That was the place I wanted to be.

But in Italy, back then, the shoemaker
was the lowest of all the classes.

No matter how humble a family,
the shoemaker was humbler still.

It happened one night
in the basement of his house.

Two of his sisters were to take Communion
and didn't have decent shoes.

What's so special about this story?
He knew how to make shoes.

In one night he created two pair of shoes.

It's not magic, it's the truth.
He made those shoes.

Coming from Bonito, was it?

And going...

I don't know if his brothers
went with him to Naples?

I mean,
Naples in itself is another galaxy.

My apprenticeship in the workshop
of Luigi Festa

had begun with the most menial tasks,

such as straightening the used nails
and taking care of his children.

Before the end of the year,
I had mastered every phase of the craft

and could produce a complete shoe.

My maestro gained fame
throughout the village

for having this talented young boy
working for him.

I was ten when my father suddenly died.

Don Belmonte, the pharmacist,
and Don Inglese, the teacher,

began to urge me to leave Bonito.

"Now it is time for you
to capitalize on your ability."

I went to my mother
and told her what they told me.

At first she objected strongly.
Finally she agreed to my plea.

It was arranged
that I should go to Naples.

It was 1909.

In Naples he finds a situation that is
the epitome of the Italian contradiction.

He finds the upscale neighborhoods,
the beautiful stores,

but also the destitute neighborhoods
like the one he probably lived in.

We have no evidence of this,
we can only make assumptions

that his situation in Naples
was particularly difficult.

I got a job in the most fashionable shop
in Naples in those days.

I told the owner I wanted to learn
how to cut the shoes and make models,

and I wanted to learn
how to take measurements

in the way they were doing in Naples.

"Well," he told me dubiously,
"that's a long job."

I started with him
and in two weeks I went from nothing

up to cutting the shoes,
making models and doing the molding.

I thought there was nothing else
I had to learn. I knew it all.

In 1915 the Italian cinema industry
was the most important in the world.

In the main cities
there were many theaters

where people went to watch films.

Ferragamo did not stay in Naples for long,

but it's likely
that the movies produced there,

where the film industry was quite racy
compared to what was done in Turin,

may have interested him.

He didn't have great financial resources

and couldn't afford the Teatro San Carlo
and the opera, another passion of his.

I had worked for a major establishment
and mastered the art of shoemaking.

I felt I was ready
to open a shop of my own.

I went to see my uncle Alessandro,
the priest, and presented my idea.

He thought I was foolish,
but advanced me twenty liras to start.

It was time to leave Naples and go home.

I was twelve years old.

I find it difficult to look inside
the secret of shoes.

Because we all know
from our own experience

that it can be comfortable
or it can be very uncomfortable.

He had the secret. You know,
when you look at Marilyn Monroe's shoes,

and you think of her
and the way she pranced around in them,

she must have been very comfortable.

And that must have been
his secret weapon,

the fact that the shoes were something
that people wanted to wear.

Manolo, this movie is titled
The Shoemaker of Dream.

Which is exactly what happened,
I was going to tell you, that I...

Like in the '70s, when I came to London,
I got under the arches in Notting Hill,

a copy of Shoemaker of Dreams.

This is the first time,
actually the second time,

that I just got to know
something about his life

and his wonderful achievements,
so it was very interesting

because at the time,
I was starting to do shoes myself, so...

Back in Bonito,
I engaged two assistants:

an eighteen-year-old who worked
for another village shoemaker,

and a boy of seven
to straighten the nails.

I wanted to recreate
the sort of boutique I knew in Naples.

but I couldn't afford to do that.

So I took over
a small hallway in our house

between the front door and the kitchen.

I placed some shoes on the table
to show to the customers,

and opened the door,

so that everybody could see
that I was doing the work myself.

Villagers came by and looked in,

and I became known
as "Salvatore the Shoemaker,"

who had been to Naples
to learn the trade of shoemaking,

and who could make high heel shoes.

Soon I was making shoes
for all the signore in Bonito.

My two assistants increased to six.
I was the youngest of them. It was 1912.

And now a message from our sponsor!
Queen Quality Shoes Company.

My older brother Alfonso lived in Boston
and worked at the factory.

When he returned to Bonito,
he visited my shop with great admiration,

but couldn't stop talking about
Queen Quality Shoes.

"We make fine shoes on machines," he said,
"Thousands of pairs a day."

I was not interested in mass production.

It dawned on me, however,
that no matter how hard I worked,

I could never expect
more than a modest income.

If I went to America,
I could learn their tricks,

and perhaps improve on them.

Again, I began to dream.

It's not ambition,
I hate this word, it's awful.

I like determination,
and this is what the man did have.

That surprised me, actually.
The huge determination of a boy from...

Where? Bonito. I love that. Bonito. And...

Determination was the key to his success.

Early on a spring morning
I said goodbye to Elio,

kissed my mother and sisters,
and set off for Naples.

I carried a heavy suitcase
with two shirts,

a change of underclothing,
spare socks, salami and cheese.

Determined not to look provincial,

I was wearing
my brand-new rust-colored gabardine coat

with a fur collar.

And there I was
with my third-class ticket.

I did not know what I expected to find.

My cabin was in the bowels of the ship,
it was small, dirty.

Men, women, and children
were herded in cramped conditions

that made the cabins look like stables.

In my pocket I had my entire savings,

the 100 lire required
by American law for immigrants.

We knew what everybody else knew
about his trip to the United States,

but he didn't go into much detail,
not that I remember.

He spoke of the courage,

he talked about it to teach us
to have courage in life,

to be very determined
to conquer what you want.

This was one of his basic principles.

I remember he often told us that
if there was something we had undertaken,

that we had started doing,

or wanted to do,
and we'd found obstacles

or encountered difficulties,

we should never,
never leave it unfinished,

but go all the way first and then decide
if we wanted to continue or not.

But never "to give up,"
as the Americans say.

The Stampalia nosed her way
into New York Harbor

on a March morning in 1915.

I was a boy approaching
a strange country alone,

with no knowledge of the language.

I looked at the tall buildings

and wanted desperately
to climb to their roofs.

I don't recall feeling any sense of loss.

I felt at home in America
even before my feet touched soil.

In a sense, it must have been
an act of freedom, a chance of even...

Like Bob Dylan says, "You don't
find yourself, you create yourself."

There's no finding yourself.
You create, and then you recreate.

And this was the place,
still is the place, in a sense,

to create yourself, and that's what
he would have found himself doing.

To prepare to pass
through the immigration barrier,

I wrapped a dollar bill
around some scraps of paper

and tied the bundle with an elastic band.

When the officials asked me
if I had the twenty dollars,

I showed them the roll,

they nodded
and told me I could go through.

There are many different facets
to this country,

and it's all being created.

It's not set. It still isn't set.

It's still being created.

We're having our greatest test right now
since the Civil War.

Six days and six nights.

I stared out the windows,
fascinated by the vastness of the land.

In Bonito, I had thought
my parents' property large.

Here, I realized
that it was only a postage stamp.

In America he believed
he'd find the ability to make shoes

with a different care,

but he also probably imagined
he'd find a faster, more dynamic world

in which he could try things out
and show what he's worth.

That's why he didn't stay
in Boston, I think.

In Boston he would have been
a factory worker

in one of the many chains
of some important factory maybe,

but he decided
to go to the other side instead.

The Queen Quality Shoe
Manufacturing Company

was exactly as my brother Alfonso
had described it.

Everything I could do, the machines did
in the twinkling of an eye.

But I was not impressed, I was appalled.

I stood dazed, watching thousands of shoes
on the endless belts.

They were heavy, clumsy, and brutal,

and far below the standard
I had set for myself.

That was not shoemaking.
That was no place for me.

Salvatore,
today it's our wedding anniversary,

and you are
and will always be by my side.

Since you left us,

my life has been intense and very active,

trying to make your dreams come true.

I must say that only now
am I taking some time off,

thanks to the valuable contribution
our children give to the company.

I can pause to look
at what has been done,

and I'm here to tell you
about the events,

joys, anxieties of all these years.

It was you who laid the groundwork
in the education of our children.

The task has been easier for me.

I was in a transcontinental railroad car

heading west
through a fabulous countryside,

the youngest on the train.

I was seventeen years old.

As the train ran through
the vastness of this unknown land,

I didn't feel sad, or alone.

I just felt free.

My heart full of hope and dreams.

And then he gets to California.
Santa Barbara first.

The dream was always of California.

It was like the promised land
for those coming from all over the world.

You couldn't get further west. That's it.

And so California... anything goes.

You can make yourself over three times,
four times, it doesn't matter.

The earth was beautiful.

My grandfather, my mother's father,
always wanted to go to California

because he could grow things in the earth.

He made it as far as Staten Island,
with a little garden.

Although I was the youngest of the family,

in Santa Barbara
my brothers let me do whatever I wanted.

A new world was opening up
before my eyes.

It was a good life.

And with the First World War
raging across Europe,

there was no chance to return home,
even if I wanted to.

I moved into our new family nest,
half a world away from our mother.

I think primarily Ferragamo moved here
because his brother was working here,

and so he had that family connection.

They stayed because, you know,
they had a successful tailoring shop.

And also they were getting
that Flying A Studio business,

making clothes, shoes,
repairing shoes, etc.

For a time,
one of the largest movie studios,

believe it or not, in the country,

was the Flying A Studio,
which came to Santa Barbara in 1912.

It closed its doors in 1920.

But especially in the early period,
the first years,

as I said, it was one of the largest--
It was sort of Hollywood before Hollywood.

The world of cinema was being created,
but nobody knew that.

There was a demand for moving pictures,
whether they were one reel or two reels.

This is right around the time
Griffith did Birth of a Nation,

a long film, it was right after Cabiria,
which was the grand epic,

which once it was released
and shown in theaters,

there was less need for short films.

This is the idea,
"Go for features," right?

So here's this place in California,
the great thing about California?

The weather. Okay.

When there's no earthquake,
when there's no fire,

when there's no flood, no mudslides,
other than that, it's really great.

We have no idea how many films
Ferragamo might have contributed to.

He wasn't credited at the time.

And I don't believe documentation exists
of listing every time

that he made shoes for a production,

also when those shoes were reused,
when the costumes were reused,

when the set designs were reused,
which would have happened all the time,

particularly as a studio, you're recycling
as a way of saving money.

I love Ferragamo shoes.

I have a pair of his embroidered boots
that he made in the '60s,

and then I bought reproductions of them.

They're just gorgeous,
they have Chinese satin on them.

He was such an inventor!

Ferragamo invented
so many different kinds of platforms,

fabulous platform shoes.

I mean, he was a huge innovator,
he knew everything about the foot.

Perceived wisdom is that the people
that were making films

were not looking to market their stars,

because it shifted
the power balance very quickly.

At the same time, not coincidentally,

and again because you have the studios
using the same actors all the time,

people started to recognize players.

Sort of before that,
they were a little more anonymous,

it would just be some players,

and audiences started
to want to see certain people:

"Oh, who's that girl, who's this person?"

But then slowly very quickly,

it becomes clear
that it's a wonderful marketing tool.

They became royalty,
they became world-famous.

Anywhere they went in the world,
they could be recognized.

So the big stars,
no matter how humble their origins,

became, in a society without royalty
and without that kind of privileged class,

they became the top famous people.

When you talk of these people,
of these artists,

it's like a pantheon of Greek gods
and goddesses, you know,

and so I think they became this phenomenon

which completely overtook a mass audience

to the point of,
kind of hysteria in a way.

The silent era has probably the best era
for female actresses.

I think when you think now
of the silent era,

you probably think
more of women than men stars,

but you had Mary Pickford,
you had Clara Bow,

you had Lillian Gish, you had Mae Marsh.

All Ferragamo clients, by the way.

Okay, fair enough.

"The West would have
been conquered earlier

if they had boots like these!"

This is what director Cecil B. De Mille
said about my boots for Westerns.

The work was hard, but I didn't care.

I helped my brothers at the repair shop,

crafted custom-made shoes
for my actor friends,

and made shoes for films.

A dream come true.

The requests for made-to-order shoes
had become quite numerous,

but despite taking measurements
using the traditional method,

sometimes the shoes fit,
sometimes they did not.

How could that be?

I concluded that there was
something wrong with the method itself.

So I enrolled as an evening student

at the University of Southern California,
in Los Angeles,

a hundred miles away from Santa Barbara,
to learn human anatomy.

I asked all sorts of questions.

Finally one night the professor asked me,

"Why, Mr. Ferragamo,
are you so interested in the skeleton?"

"I am a shoemaker," I answered,
"and I'm interested in the feet."

Talking to him broadened my mind.

He lent me books on the anatomy
of the skeleton, and I studied feet.

And finally I acquired the knowledge
that I was looking for:

The relationship between
the human body and its feet.

The peculiar art of footwear
also required solid scientific principles.

"I found out that the weight
of the body in an upright position

falls vertically
over the arch of the foot,

as shown by the plumb line,"
stated Salvatore Ferragamo, then adding:

"Hence I studied my forms
giving maximum support to the arch

to restore the foot's natural balance."

Balance is fundamental in many things.

But he made his first study on balance

when he wanted to prove

that the weight of a standing person
fell on the arch of the foot,

and therefore he wanted
to produce his shoes, his footwear,

following this principle.

And I believe
that this balance, eventually,

was conceived and applied
in so many things he did.

It's a grace to have balance.

And he did a whole study
on the American fit,

not only based on the length of the foot
but on its shape, its width,

since a country like the United States
has so many different ethnic groups.

Hence, also different physical structures.

Anglo-Saxons usually have a very thin foot
while Asians have a wider foot.

In theory, you'd need six fits,
six different widths for the same length.

This was the most important key
to his success.

Comfort combined with creativity,
the aesthetic part.

The great thing about Salvatore Ferragamo

was that he was a craftsman
more than anything else,

even with all these famous people
that put his shoes on,

with all that side of it,
what he really was at the beginning

was somebody who understood
the craft of making a shoe.

I think probably what Ferragamo realized

is that yes, there's more and more
that's happening there,

and it probably was
a good place for him to go

to try to get in early on a lot of
what was happening in the film industry.

His accident would have had
a very profound effect on him,

not just because it was the death
of his brother,

but also he would have been in hospital
for a very long time,

really thinking about it.

I think
the injury would have been very painful,

he would have wanted to try
and find a way to mitigate that pain.

He has a very bad leg break,

probably one or even
both of the long bones in his legs.

So the bone in his thigh
and the bone in his lower leg.

It may have been
that the doctors who treated him

weren't very experienced
in dealing with this injury,

it may have been that they wanted
to amputate the leg.

There was a tendency
at this point to say:

"Oh, it's okay,
we'll take the leg off for you."

Our Santa Barbara friend,
Dr. Rexwald Brown,

stepped in and took over my case.

He prescribed an ancient treatment

of pulling the leg for as long
as the patient could stand the pain,

and then relaxing the pressure.

Traction, essentially.

It was excruciating.

But there was a great deal of risk

that his leg would shorten
as the bones healed,

so he needed to make sure
that the legs stayed the same length.

From my bed,
I devised a new type of splint.

A long cylinder
into which the leg was inserted.

The top pushed against the pelvic joints,

and the limb was pulled
by a device at the foot end,

which could be tightened
or loosened as required.

Once fixed,
it would maintain the pressure.

My splint lessened the pain considerably
and improved treatment efficiency.

I think
what's really interesting about this

is that it has the foot section.

He's thinking about the leg,
but he's also thinking about the foot

and the elaborateness
of the section that he's invented

means that he is thinking about this
in a very complete way.

He understands the relationship
between the leg and the foot.

And as he lay there in bed
wearing an uncomfortable splint,

understanding probably better than
his doctors it wasn't working properly,

he has plenty of time
to come up with an alternative.

It's beautifully made,
and the shoemaker in him

can't resist tweaking and fiddling,

and he must at some point realized

that existing technology
couldn't be adapted.

What was going to be needed
was a completely new model.

My father was very creative
and also very ingenious,

so when he created something
very special, he got a patent for it.

They were mainly related to footwear,

the most important I remember dealt
with unusual heels or constructions,

the famous cage heel,
made of small metal wires,

but they make
a solid structure all together.

Ferragamo was a patent maniac,

and patents are part
of the American Dream.

They incorporate the idea
that everyone can use the same systems

and get to be known
for what your own mind

or imagination is able to create.

Therefore, Ferragamo, relentlessly,

filed patents
by the thousands of all kinds,

shoes, the fit of the shoes,
the metallic arch inside the heel.

Not forgetting his disquisitions
on non-footwear subjects too.

I am very fond of the patent regarding

a "Military Fort for Space Defense,"

so that no missile could hit
an earthly target,

very interesting for those years.

He really looked to the future
because in the ancient Italian tradition,

there were no patents, everything was
of the people, everything was shared.

The patent is the idea of innovating,
while bringing American modernity

within the Italic features
from the Neo-Renaissance onwards.

The Hollywood to which I came,
in the spring of 1923,

was no more than a village in the sun.

There was a scattering of palatial homes.

My own was just below
the Hollywoodland sign,

not far from Charlie Chaplin's.

The Hollywoodland sign
was put up in the 1920s

as an advertisement for people
to come and build houses

and live in what's now
the Beachwood Canyon area,

right under the Hollywood sign.

It remained Hollywoodland
up on the side of the mountain

until the late 1940s
and then they took it down, the "land,"

the last four letters were taken down
so it would just say Hollywood,

but for many years
it was called Hollywoodland.

It was small. It was a village,
there were orange groves,

but it was not a giant metropolis
and the Hollywood actors

and sort of the film industry moved there,
or ended up congealing there,

obviously changed
the complete face of the place.

In 1910 in Los Angeles
there were only 320,000 people.

If you compare that to, in Europe,
Rome or London or Paris,

or New York for that matter,
it was nothing,

absolutely this small, little place.

People forget there was no radio
until the early '20s,

there was theater,
but not everybody could afford theater.

My parents, my grandparents,
they couldn't go to theater, you know?

So, you have cinema,
you have the movies, you have...

And what a way to be able
to create a fashion,

so to speak,
with people seeing it on the screen.

And then the idea of the movie palaces
took over and it was a place of luxury

and a place of great entertainment
that average people didn't have access to

and something
that everyone could partake in,

and it was like an escape
into this other marvelous world,

and so clearly the appeal of it
was enormous,

and that's why the business grew
as quickly as it did,

and the glamour of it too.

I quickly found exactly the retail space
I wanted for my business:

a two-story footwear boutique

at the corner of Hollywood
and Las Palmas Boulevards,

known as the Hollywood Boot Shop.

I filled the interior
with a series of colonnades

designed to shut off the fitting place

from the main entrance space,

and to ensure an atmosphere
of privacy and discretion.

I opened the shop with a flourish.

The stars sent goodwill messages
and huge bunches of flowers,

and many came in person, including
Douglas Fairbanks and Mary Pickford,

Gloria Swanson, Pola Negri,
and Monty Banks.

My life had taken another track.

When the cinema industry moved
to Hollywood, my father didn't hesitate.

He went there and opened
his first real store in 1923.

Your husband's customers
were very important people.

Yes, they were.

Any fun fact, for example,
any unusual event?

He used to tell many really strange
and amusing stories

about the time he spent in Hollywood.

For example, people like Gloria Swanson,

Mary Pickford, Lillian Gish,

had actually become his friends,

and sometimes
they went to get him out of bed

to have some spaghetti together.

Many odd things, yes...

I'm getting emotional, so...

Barrymore used to drop into my shop
for a drink, as well as to buy shoes.

It was the time of Prohibition,

and while stars could get
most anything they wanted,

I always kept a bottle of something
tucked away in the back of the salon

for such occasions.

I became known
as a mixer of splendid drinks

and was asked to parties
more as a barman than as a guest.

While everyone was drinking
my concoctions,

I stood behind the bar
with a glass of what looked like whiskey,

but was in fact ginger ale.

Hollywood was a very social place,
there are parties all the time.

You have to remember
you've got these people

who are suddenly earning
a huge amount of money,

people who had struggled before,

maybe were earning nothing in vaudeville
or nothing on stage,

and suddenly they're stars.

So of course you're going to splurge,
you're gonna spend a lot of money,

you're gonna buy a big house,
you want a pool.

You're in California, you need a pool.

What happened, how did cinema
and how did Valentino and Ferragamo,

all of that come together
to create such a phenomenon?

He was a beautiful boy,
debonair and perfectly groomed,

with every hair slicked down,

every movement
and every gesture thoughtfully measured.

He would drop by my house
on Beachwood Drive

and eat a bowl of spaghetti,
and we'd speak in Italian.

For him, I made white nubuck
and black calfskin Oxford shoes.

His command on the screen
was extraordinary.

We do remember the shoes.

He was an extraordinary figure
that tapped into the mass psychosis,

so to speak, an emotional response.
Look at what happened at the funeral.

An emotional response
the country had never seen before, really.

You may have had big funerals
for political figures

and that sort of thing, but not like this.

The merits of my work had spread,

and most of the studios asked me
to make shoes for them:

Paramount, Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer,
the Warner Brothers, Universal Studios.

One of the biggest genres, and you
certainly know this from Italian films,

are the Biblical and historical epics,

because you could show something
that no stage could ever contain,

with these enormous sets
of ancient Babylon,

and ancient Rome and so on.

The Ten Commandments was
my first commission for a shoe wardrobe

of a spectacle film of such immensity.

I had never designed shoes for
the Babylonian-Egyptian-Hebraic period,

and my knowledge of the times was nil.

I sat down to work
and the inspiration came.

I took the results to DeMille.

He was delighted and enthusiastic,
and I had no corrections to make.

I also worked for D.W. Griffith.

By then, The Birth of a Nation
and Intolerance were already behind him,

and there were many more films to come,
including The White Rose

and Way Down East, for which I did
the shoes for Lillian Gish.

He worked very closely
with the costume designer

and designed a shoe to fit
the costume and the character.

I mean, more than to fit,
but to match and to enhance.

D.W. Griffith was fond of pretty feet,
and pretty legs and ankles as well.

So he suggested
that we hold a beauty competition

for the best feet, ankles,
and legs in Hollywood.

He would offer the first prize,
a six-month film contract,

and I could give second and third prizes,
which were shoes.

The winner was Marjorie Howard.

My choice was a girl with beautiful legs
who was trying hard to break into films.

Her name was Joan Crawford.

What would you like me to do
with this beautiful thing?

I think it's my size!

The Thief of Bagdad,
with Douglas Fairbanks,

was enormously successful,
one of the biggest hits of the '20s.

There was a lot of room for liberty

in the kind of things that any designer
could come up with on a film like that.

You know, the more flashy and outrageous,
the better, probably.

This shoe is so much more beautiful
than it needed to be.

I love holding it, I love touching it.

It is so completely sensual.
Look how it's made!

Unless you had a close-up
or an insert of this shoe,

you would never see
how magnificently constructed it is.

And can you imagine
Douglas Fairbanks wearing it?

I mean, he was the king of Hollywood
at the time.

Aren't these the shoes for a king?

I had immense respect
for my Hollywood customers.

Great actors and actresses,
whether on stage or screen,

always give of themselves,

drawing upon their exceptional depths
of emotion and sensation

to convey everything to their audiences.

I had the privilege of seeing
some of them in front of the cameras too.

Pola Negri was so intense,

I feared she would not live
through the performance!

I didn't realize then,

but I would carry on making shoes
for them throughout my career.

So in California,
he was very lucky to meet all those--

Can you imagine?
All those movie queens like, I mean...

Pola Negri, you know, Marion Davies,

and he did shoes for many of those women,
I don't even know which ones, but...

Gloria Swanson included, so...
You know, I'm mad about silent movies.

In fact, I prefer silent movies
over anything else.

Sadie Thompson,
it's about a really bad girl.

So these were supposed
to be really-bad-girl shoes.

Gloria Swanson was
a tiny, tiny little person

with a very big face
and a very long career,

and she was a very strong person.

And I'm sure
that she controlled her image.

It became an iconic character,

and whenever you think of it, you think
of Gloria Swanson in that version

because of the audacious nature
of the footwear, really.

This is a tragic role,
a role of a woman who wants out.

Well, she was a streetwalker,

and that's why this bow
is a little bit too big,

and that's why these heels
are a little too high,

because this would have affected
how she walked,

and you would have seen these bows
if she crossed her legs.

So this is a very deliberate style.

Plus...

You know what the ankle strap was called?

-No.
-No.

Well, I can't say it on film.

-No, please.
-You can. You have to!

Gloria Swanson was playing Sadie Thompson
in a black-and-white movie.

That's another reason
why this bow is so important,

because in any black-and-white movie
you just have shades of gray,

and everything is about reflection.

See the reflection on the shoe?
It's gonna catch the light.

And contrast.

You will definitely see
this bow pop in the movie,

so it will attract attention
to her legs and to her ankles.

Along with this exceptional imagination,
this sense of shoe fashion,

that was generally
still very poor at that time,

he wanted to create a product
that had something special in it,

that would have a perfect fit,
something, let's say,

bigger than a normal product.

So he returned to Italy,

looking for this excellent manpower

that he knew he would find,

and he chose to go to Florence.

He chose Florence for various reasons,
for its craftsmanship,

and because he liked the city very much,

he was greatly attracted
to this small, neat, refined city.

The strength to leave a success
he never would have dreamed of

to follow the dream of "Made in Italy,"
which he pioneered.

Salvatore Ferragamo, as soon as he arrived
in Florence with his movie camera,

a real jewel for that time,
filmed the center of Florence.

He filmed Lungarno, the Uffizi,

Ponte alle Grazie with its small chapels
still intact before the bombing.

He then turned his camera around,

filming his sisters
wearing beautiful straw hats,

then the hills in an almost prophetic way

because he filmed the hills
right in the spot

where he will later buy his villa.

Florence is the city that he chose.

He chose Florence and the Tuscan territory

for its great traditions of culture,
of craftsmanship,

for the opportunities he had
to develop his work to the fullest.

Coming back from the United States,
he knew exactly what he wanted.

The United States had been
a springboard for him,

an extraordinary school of life,

but they could not offer him
that extra something we have in Italy:

the artisan labor force
that is part of our cultural traditions.

So he decided to return to Italy,

he thought a lot about it,
he told us about this so many times,

and he chose Florence
for this very reason.

Once he got here,
it was Florence that conquered him.

In 1927, when Ferragamo returned to Italy,

the Fascist regime
was quite well established

but not yet totally in control
of all the aspects.

The Italian 1920s are much more nuanced
and controversial

compared to the 1930s
when the regime became a total one.

There is a whole mechanism that makes
Florence the place where foreigners

are invited to visit fashion stores.

Couture at that time was based in Paris.

Italy was limited to tailoring,
but it was very good at accessories.

When he arrived in Florence
he understood that the art matrix,

which is the distinctive
basic element of the city,

could become, together with
the technology learned in America,

a springboard towards shoe production

with a functional material
that would not only be comfortable,

it would also combine beauty.

Beauty meant
as knowledge of the materials.

The plan was simple.

I would make shoes here
and sell them in America,

to former as well as new customers.

I went to see various artisans
all over the city and told them my idea.

For my new workshop,
I insisted upon certain processes.

Some of the boys were natural shoemakers,

some less so,
but all were keen to learn.

I organized them in sections,
teaching each one a specific task.

It was like a manufacturing line
but with craftsmen.

It worked.

In a short time,
I had eighteen single shoes,

each quite different from the other.

I was full of hope
and the certainty of success.

I had something to take back to America,
something entirely new.

After he returned to Italy
and settled in Florence after 1927,

he went to America
to present to the buyers

these 18 shoe models he had made with...

Great passion, putting together
a team of artisans and shoemakers.

Grandfather describes how he had put
these shoes on brown velvet

and the love with which
he had arranged his "creatures."

But when this Mr. Miller arrived,
he looked at them in silence

and didn't even touch them,
which struck my grandfather very much.

Grandfather said he felt
he was suffocating, he almost fainted,

then he remained alone
in the room with his shoes,

and there's something
that moved me so much

because he said it was as if the shoes
were talking to him, and they said...

"Salvatore, it's not true,
keep working, don't stop.

There's something here."

He thought he was going crazy.
"Shoes can't be talking to me," he said.

He believed in what he had done,

he didn't lose heart
and called another buyer,

then the story continued.

I called Manuel Gerton,
the buyer for Saks Fifth Avenue,

who came right away.

He was overwhelmed.

His eyes brightened.

"These shoes are marvelous," he said,
"I want them all."

We'll tell you a beautiful fairy tale:
"The Ferragamo Family."

A beautiful fairy tale,
an Italian fairy tale.

Not wanting to give in to the temptation
of the assembly line, so to speak,

he returned to Florence,
his adoptive town,

where he created a model factory
with workers, his colleagues,

and they produced shoes, but he had
no luck and went bankrupt, is that true?

Yes, he had great financial difficulties.

As a consequence
of the Great Depression of 1929.

The Great Depression of 1929 deeply
affected Ferragamo's business.

At that time, he didn't make shoes
for the Italian market,

he had no Italian or European customers,
he only had American customers.

At that time,
when he moved from America to Italy

and until the end of WWII, he had...

eighteen years of great satisfaction
but also of incredible difficulties.

So much so that in 1933,

he declared bankruptcy
and closed down his company.

So the Ferragamo Company
shut down in 1933.

My factory was closed, and a great seal
lay upon the door, forbidding entrance.

My eyes filled with tears.

At this place, we had done
beautiful work, beautiful shoes.

A few of the younger workers
whom I had trained stood on the sidewalk.

"Please, don't cry," they said.

"Can't you take us somewhere
where we can start work again?"

It was absurd to consider
that I could do anything for them,

or much for myself.

And then I thought, "But is it absurd?

Was it perhaps possible if...?"

I was not destitute.

I had my hands and my brain.

I had these work people faithful to me.

And I could make shoes again,
if only I could raise a little money

and a few orders.

Inspired by the same values
that led me to leave Bonito

and aim for America,
I decided to start all over again.

Working secretly after bankruptcy,

he managed in a couple of years
to pay off his debts,

and start up his business again.

With some young workers at his side,

he moves his workshop to another location.

He starts knocking at the doors

of all the customers who had courted him
since his arrival in Italy.

He starts again in Florence,

determined to make his plan work.

Ferragamo understood
the importance of having a place

that reflected his clientele,
an evocative environment.

That's why, despite bankruptcy,

he made the choice to rent some rooms

in the most important building
in the city, Palazzo Spini Feroni.

...Palazzo Feroni,
and turned the 700-year-old palace...

Palazzo Feroni Spini...

Palazzo Spini Feroni is
a former town hall.

At the edge of the Roman center,
inside the walls, in a strategic position.

It's situated on an important road axis
arriving from Rome.

It was on the Arno River,

on a corner which enabled it
to dominate the old city

since it was on its edges.

Relatively speaking,
it was not in the open country either,

but there clearly wasn't
the urban fabric we have now.

He understands that the Palazzo

is a place that perfectly contains

all the elements that the Anglo-Americans

had formulated and projected on the city.

He understood that this could become
an evocative place

for his career and his business.

And it's among the beautiful frescoes
of Palazzo Feroni

that Fulvia designs
the new patterns of her foulards.

He was already a tenant of the shop,
and the owner of the property

was convinced
he would never be able to buy it

because of his recent bankruptcy,
he already had other debts to pay,

it was clearly a very risky purchase.

He therefore wrote up a tying contract
to be paid in installments,

so if he didn't pay the last installment,
he'd lose all his money and the building.

It would be crazy today.
If you look at the numbers of that time,

the cost of the building
and the financial situation he was in,

it probably was a crazy thing,
but he was so convinced of his abilities.

-But not that crazy.
-No, because he succeeded.

I enjoyed going to the lounge
next to where we are now,

with the wooden crates,
everything was shipped by boat,

we are talking about
the years 1955-1956-1958.

It was fascinating to see what happened,

because in the next room
shoemakers worked with a music of hammers

that resounded on the wooden molds
resting on the worker's knee.

The symbolism in the shoe
is that of metamorphosis.

When you lose a shoe,
a prince will follow you,

he will slip it on your foot
and you will become a princess.

So the person who makes it,
the shoemaker, has a magical power,

and in all ancient cultures, for example,
in the Hindu world and the Buddhist world,

the shoemaker is
the quintessential philosopher,

because he lives alone, he's at his desk,
he has extremely complex thoughts.

It's no coincidence that there's
a long genealogy of mystical shoemakers.

That's why we say the shoe has
its own magic and mystical potential

that is recognized by all cultures.
With certain shoes you can be invisible,

with certain shoes you can fly.

With what shoes can give you,

you can become
what fashion allows us to be,

that is, another person
other than ourselves.

It is certainly one of the elements
that better describes us.

The shoe has a very long history
linked to our imagination.

A shoe is the starting point.

Some people in the morning put
on their shoes first, then get dressed.

I would say that his style refers
to a typical Italian approach,

to Italian art,
to the colors of Italian art.

Often when I look
at Ferragamo's creations,

I think of Harlequin,

of Commedia dell'Arte,
I think of the futurists.

When you think about the creativity
of that historic moment,

it was something unique to Italy

through the 1930s, the 1940s,
and then the 1950s, right after WWII.

This idea of creating products
that are at the same time

unique and somehow mass-produced.

They are handmade, but they can be
reproduced in industrial quantities.

It's almost a contradiction

to think of how each of these shoes

fits a foot so personally,

and also expresses a point of view
on fashion and the world.

I have a complicated relationship
with the concept of "invention."

I'm not interested in the subject
of Ferragamo as a great inventor.

What interests me about his innovation
is the time in which he did those things.

It was during the war, and he succeeded
in using the means available.

His greatest invention was
to succeed in being "streetwise."

All the most difficult things were
invented in a difficult moment,

this is also true for Ferragamo.

In early 1936,
my business was in full bloom again,

like it had been
during my youth in America.

Though it was not
the happiest time in Italy.

Mussolini's regime had turned darker
and more menacing.

In response to the iniquitous sanctions
aimed at depriving Italy

of raw materials indispensable for
its legitimate expansion of East Africa,

the population as a whole,
with plebiscitary impetus,

offers metals
to the unfairly boycotted homeland.

Even with a scrap of iron,
we can forge a bayonet and a plow.

Of course, the 1930s are creative years

because in the difficulty caused to Italy
by the economic sanctions after 1935,

the outbreak of war
and the difficulties in finding

the usual materials for shoemaking,

he was stimulated to create models
with absolutely exceptional materials.

It was probably easier for him
than for others

since he had worked in movies
and was used to experimenting.

To pass from tradition
to modernity in a second.

The whole fashion production cycle
had to be Italian,

from the product a dress
or an accessory was made out of,

to the creation of the model.

So it had to be of Italian design
and made with Italian materials.

And he's the one who invents
the famous wedge heel.

His style in that period reaches
its full potential

and shows how in case of need...

the truly creative person
finds important answers.

-Here we have shoes made of...
-This is raffia.

The materials he used are many indeed.

Both for reasons of creativity,
for some rather unusual models

and also, of course, during the war,

the lack of leather,
of important materials,

led him to use everything, even paper.

The cork in the wedge,
his most famous invention,

is tree bark
that makes these shoes very light.

And here he worked on the idea
of using wine corks to make this heel,

that he would leave like this, without
any covering, or cover with leather.

He was so sure of the beauty of his model

that he didn't even want to hide
the materials he had worked with.

Their craftsmanship was closer to art
than shoemaking.

This is not possible nowadays,
everything is semi-industrialized.

There are very few shoemakers
capable of making shoes, if any.

People work in chains now.

And it's not the same.
Not like there in the manufacturing.

If I like something about him,
it's he was there all the time,

controlling and seeing the work.

The structure is the most complex part
of shoemaking.

He opened new paths, created new elements
from a structural point of view.

Ferragamo created this metal layer,
which was made of steel,

to support the arch of the foot

without causing a burdening of the shoe.

The shank is always inside the shoe sole.

With the shank you give robustness
to the arcuate part of the plantar arch,

to give stability to the arch.

Without the shank,
this part would lose its curve.

I love these particularly.

They sort of articulate,
which is incredible.

I've never seen a shoe
that does that before.

They're so flattering to the feet
and creative at the same time,

which I think is difficult, you know.

A lot of times you get
very high heels or something

and the balance is all wrong and off.

You see on the runway,
girls fall over and...

Of course! This is fabulous!

Tons of people have copied this man
in that respect. Millions.

This is the invention,
what I'm talking about, invention,

something that has never been done before.

So that is exactly what I think
about what he's done, marvelously.

"Innovation" means
to push your boundaries,

it is a battle against decadence.

It's a form of creation with a challenge.

To go beyond the sure things,
what you accomplished,

what you're satisfied with,
and keep trying to push yourself.

He created a name for Italy,
in those years,

before the wonderful Italian movement.

Florence was the capital of fashion.

Although I never met my grandfather,
I sometimes feel I did know him

because he's always been very present
and his memory was kept alive

by my grandmother,
my dad and my uncles...

who have always passed on
so many stories about him.

Perhaps I heard the story many times
from my grandmother

about when she saw him arrive in Bonito.

-Our first encounter?
-Yes.

Of course I remember it!

And I also wanted to "show off," you know?

When I saw him,
because I knew he was famous,

that he used to see the actresses,
he welcomed the actresses, I knew...

In a small village, people talk.

Also because he was from that village,
so people were interested in what he did.

He went to see the mayor,
my grandmother was the mayor's daughter,

she was nineteen, very young.

My father was in his office upstairs,

I knew he was coming,
so I went downstairs...

I went downstairs and I met him,

then I did my talking
because I was pretty smart,

though not "that" smart,

I said: "You are the famous shoemaker.

Thank you for the great contribution
you give to feminine elegance."

-These were the words...
-You had prepared them.

Yes, in my mind.

These were the exact words.

Family played a fundamental role
in all of Salvatore's story.

It was a central element
in all the choices he made

and at all stages of his life.

In all relevant family moments
he was there, and when he was there,

he was also eager to tell us
what his work was like.

Living outside Florence,

we often needed to be accompanied
to courses we had in other parts of town

so we also had to wait
for a ride to get back home.

We often stopped at Palazzo Feroni,
my father's office,

waiting for him to take us home.

I sometimes speak in the plural

because I shared almost all my childhood
with my sister Fiamma, the eldest.

I sat in his office
and as it was the end of the working day,

maybe around 5:30 pm, or 6:00 pm,

that was the moment when my father
dedicated himself to creating new models.

It was a really fascinating moment
and despite being a little child,

sometimes a little eager,
as children tend to be at that age,

to do other things or run around,

I was really fascinated
to see how this man was absorbed

and focused on his creations.

He involved me in his work
and as a memory of this moment,

there is a piece of leather
with some seams,

with a little imagination
it might look like a little shoe,

and underneath it says "Leonardo 1959"

in my father's handwriting.

This was my father,

his ability to involve
and drag even a child into what he did.

Christian Dior wrote in his memoirs:

"We came from a period in which women
wore clothes as though they were soldiers,

whereas I imagined them as flowers."

His first fashion show,

with which he won
the Neiman Marcus Award,

was in fact called "Corolle."

-This was made for Judy Garland.
-And the invisible shoes.

Invisible. It's fantastic.
It was designed in 1947.

Not that there's anything
to show on television, but it is--

There is a shoe underneath,
as you realize.

You'd just be seeing
the sole and the heel.

Right. It's lovely when it's on

because you have a, you know,
complete nude look on your feet.

It's made of nylon thread.

He saw one of his workers fishing
close to Palazzo Feroni,

with this new, transparent thread.

That is a really beautiful shape.

But, you know,
this is an artist who drew this.

There's the curve at the back,
there's the curve at the front.

I don't see a straight line
in the whole shoe.

And I think there are many women
in the world who would like the idea

that they are not being constricted
by their shoes.

The "Invisible Shoe":

an invisible weaving of nylon threads
on an "F-shaped" wedge.

This creation in 1947 triumphantly
wins the "Oscar of Fashion,"

the highest American prize.

Christian Dior won this prize in 1947
for his "New Look."

Ferragamo won the same prize that year
for his "Invisible Shoe."

This prize was very important
in those days, right?

Absolutely! For Mr. Dior,
it happened to be very important.

You have to consider
that he won it with his first collection.

Neiman Marcus was a very important
department store in Dallas,

the symbol of a luxury store
in the United States.

He had a wonderful time in Dallas,
magnificent days.

Here, at an official dinner,

we can see Mr. Dior from behind,

and we can see Mr. Ferragamo.

Mr. Ferragamo, in his biography,
says that on the ship,

during the ocean crossing,
he showed his shoes to Mr. Dior,

who had asked to see them,

and Mr. Dior was very surprised
to discover

that a lot of the shoes
resembled in every way

the clothes he had created
for that occasion.

On one side there were shoes...

made of satin that evoked

the lower part of the dress,

a long satin strip
on one of Mr. Dior's dresses.

So there were many similarities
between the two creations,

and they were both very surprised
because they had just created them.

Mr. Dior and Mr. Ferragamo
had a common trait,

they were both strategists,

they shared an international,
world vision of their business,

the creation of boutiques,

they were both visionaries,
within their areas.

My father worked
as though he had an atelier.

He had a customer in front of him,

and for that customer he designed a shoe

according to the personality
of that person.

Rather than making a custom-made shoe,
it was a tailor-made model.

I looked more at the beautiful ladies,
even though I was very young,

and I couldn't believe my eyes
because I came here and saw ladies...

who were very well known in movies

and when I told my friends at school,
they didn't believe me,

also because in school I wasn't considered
a very brilliant student.

My father explained
how he wanted the customer to feel

and said that every customer had
to feel like a princess

when they entered the shop,
and every princess like a queen.

It came quite... Quite unexpected.

He was looking very tired,
and lacking in strength,

and my mother was a little alarmed,
so they started seeing doctors.

At the time there were few means

of prevention or early diagnosis,

everything was a bit unclear, so to speak.

I don't know if it was sixth sense,

he was a man who looked far ahead

compared to the moment he lived in...

I don't know if he suspected anything,

but he had already asked my sister Fiamma
to support him in his work.

Fiamma had been working with him
for a year and a half,

right in his office,
around the collections, the creations,

and all this part
of promoting collections.

She was the person at home,
among all of us, who had more...

Who was more familiar with his work.

My mother said
that on the day of the funeral...

she didn't really know
what she would do the following day.

It was August, the factories were closed
and would reopen in September,

and in this uncertainty,
after the funeral,

some of the workers loyal to my father
approached her,

shook her hand and said:

"Mrs. Ferragamo,
you must continue, we will help you."

Unfortunately, those are our last memories
because he was alert right until the end,

so he always had a few words
and some messages to give

that stuck in our minds,
especially at my age, we were very young.

Fiamma and I were extremely
worried about our mother,

because she was experiencing...

A sad moment,
and a very difficult future loomed ahead,

because my father loved her
and she loved him.

They had a wonderful relationship,
which we were all well aware of

because they showed it at all times,
every day,

and she was a lot younger than him,
and knowing that she would be alone

worried us a great deal,
especially Fiamma and myself,

we were the "mature ones," so to speak.

Family is such a beautiful thing...
Such a beautiful thing.