Stefania Ricci – författare

This is the catalogue of the important exhibition dedicated to Wanda Miletti Ferragamo, which focuses on female empowerment in various domains from the 1960s onward.This catalogue accompanies the exhibition Women in Balance at the Museo Salvatore Ferragamo in Florence. The project arose as a tribute to Wanda Miletti Ferragamo, who guided the Salvatore Ferragamo company from 1960 until her death in 2018.The volume aims to tell the story of the women who balanced their roles as mothers and wives with their work during the years of the Italian “economic miracle” and beyond. The story of Wanda Ferragamo’s life is accompanied by the voices of women from diverse fields who embodied their time and helped to shape it.Focus is placed on women who have been pioneers in their fields (politics, literature, photography, cinema, art, music, business, science, and technology). This catalogue seeks to trigger reflections on gender relations in contemporary society and the balance needed to reconcile women’s private lives with their passions and professional aspirations.

A thorough exploration of Salvatore Ferragamo’s life and work: an inescapable opportunity to analyze the importance of his creativity and entrepreneurial instinct.One hundred years have passed since Salvatore Ferragamo opened his first store, the Hollywood Boot Shop, opposite the recently built Grauman’s Egyptian Theater in Hollywood. This set the seal on the success he achieved in America, where he had emigrated in 1915. He was perfectly integrated in the film world of those years, as important directors entrusted him with the design and creation of shoes for the film stars. His customers were movie actresses and actors, producers, and directors, who could no longer do without the elegant and comfortable footwear of the “shoemaker to the stars,” as the young man from Irpinia was nicknamed. Furthermore, his persona had a certain standing in Hollywood: he sat on the city’s executive committees and lived on the same street as Charlie Chaplin. On May 4, 1923, Holly Leaves magazine pointed out just how much Ferragamo was doing for the city and its residents.The book illustrates various aspects of his life and work, including the difficulties he had to endure during the war, which in the end resulted in incredible surges of creativity, using the limited materials available during those years of scarcity. He literally made shoes with everything, from corks to fish skin.A wide selection of Ferragamo’s patents is also featured. Kept today in the Archivio Centrale dello Stato in Rome, these important documents testify to his boundless creativity and mastery of the trade.