Our Ferragamo Museum & Oltrarno tour is designed for curious, discerning travelers, with a little extra time in Florence to go beyond the obvious ‘highlights’. As Salvatore Ferragamo said: “There is no limit to beauty, no saturation point in design, no end to the material”. Ah, we also recommend this tour to shoes’ addicts…

A walk along some of the glamour streets of Florentine (and Italian) fashion will work as an introduction to our visit to Ferragamo Museum, located at the end of via Tornabuoni , by Santa Trinita’ bridge. We enter the basement of medieval Palazzo Spini Feroni, a noble mansion acquired by Salvatore Ferragamo in 1938.

The Museum opened in 1995, one of the earliest company museums in Italy, founded by the Ferragamo family, with the purpose of illustrating the importance of Salvatore in the history of shoe design and in the promotion of Italian fashion on the world scene. The museum admission supports fashion design students.

The Ferragamo Museum stars a huge variety of shoes (10,000 models!), wooden shoe lasts with the signature of the stars, patents, photos, films, clothes and accessories organized into thematic exhibitions which change every two years. At this moment the exhibit is ‘Sustainable Thinking’, until March 8th, 2020.

The first two rooms will be the occasion to learn more about the company’s founder: born a poor boy in 1898 in a small village near Naples, Salvatore Ferragamo excelled in the art of shoe making and started his own business when he was still a teenager. Became famous in Hollywood as the shoemaker of the stars.

After a long stay with his brothers in California, where he also studied anatomy at the university in order to make his creations comfortable too, he came back to Italy in 1927, choosing Florence as his headquarters, recognizing the city’s primate on craftsmanship, the long leather-working traditions and her unique charm.

While visiting the exhibition, you’ll learn from your guide about Judy Garland, Marilyn Monroe, Katherine Hepburn