Here we have a shoe shop, but not just because of Salvatore Ferragamo`s first venture at his parents` home.
For in 1915 he emigrated to America, to Boston, to join one of his brothers who was living there, and working, coincidentally, or not, in a factory making boots. Salvatore loved making the boots, but not the factory atmosphere, and so he moved on, to California. He then suggested that his brothers move there too, which they did.
Once there, it is often said that he opened a shoe shop, called the Hollywood Boot Shop. However this is slightly incorrect, as his first shop, a shoe repairers was in Santa Barbara, and he had operated that for seven years before he got the option of leasing the Hollywood Boot Shop, at 6687 Hollywood Boulevard, which was already operating under that name. He bought the shop outright in 1923.
When he leased it, he also took on its clientele and its reputation, which was considerable, as it was one of the oldest shoe shops in the area, formerly operated by Morgan and Stoll, and more recently run by J. M. Bohannon.
In addition, they were already making shoes for the movies.
The first pair of Salvatore Ferragamo’s shoes to appear in the movies were made in 1923 for Cecil B. DeMille’s epic, “The Ten Commandments”. This was filmed all around Santa Barbara, with the scene of the parting of the Red Sea being shot at Seal Beach. It was not filmed as live action, by the way, the parting of the waves was one take, as a model, and the scenes of the people walking through the parted waves was superimposed later.
However from this tiny beginning came his fame, and his nickname, "Shoemaker to the Stars" - though it is suggested that he designed the nickname rather than waiting for it to be given. We do know that one of his best clients was Rudolph Valentino, who had all his shoes made there after the first pair had fitted so well. He had quite high arches, and he would have much appreciated the comfort of having shoes specially made to compensate for this. And remember that Salvatore Ferragamo had studied anatomy in Naples at the age of thirteen. More than that though, he had gone back to school, at the University of Southern California, to again study anatomy, at a higher level.
Then, in 1927, Ferragamo upped and left, returning to Italy. He based himself in Florence. Some wonder why this occurred, but his time in the United States was always going to be temporary. He went there to learn, to work in a factory, and then to broaden out into a shop. This he had done, with great success. But he also realised that the American way, of making shoes by machines, to fit everyone, was not his way. And at home he would find many more skilled craftsmen who he could charge with making his shoes, made to measure, by hand - plus young Italian men, whom he could teach. He knew that would never be possible in America.
Unfortunately his dreams briefly flickered and almost died, and though he had a large list of American contacts, the distance was too great, the costs of shipping a small quantity of hand made shoes too expensive, and he filed for bankruptcy in 1933.
He pondered for quite a while on the idea of his returning to America, but eventually decided against it. For one thing, he met a local girl, the daughter of his family`s doctor, and he married her in 1940, when she was only eighteen. They had six children, and she became the head designer for the Ferragamo company. And so he stayed in Florence apart from short trips, for important things, like opening his New York Branch in 1948.
His marriage brought him peace and the chance at a new beginning. Also there was another second chance, which fell right into his lap, and that was the Second World War, for as it progressed, and more and more shoe making materials became unavailable, his skill at working with the more unusual came flooding back, and he was one of the few people to still be making shoes - from things that nobody else would have imagined, soles and heels made from cork, using dyes to take the place of the now hard to get coloured fabrics and leathers. In fact he also invented the "wedge" heel, which distributed the weight of the foot right along the sole, invaluable for ladies who were working in factories all day long on war work. Also, after the war, he did not have to wait until the formerly rationed materials came back, so his staff and name expanded rapidly, and his former contacts started to return.
And, in one of his greatest coups, he managed to make a pair of shoes for Marilyn Monroe.
He died in 1960 at the age of just sixty-two. His wife took over the company, and ran it for over twenty years, slowly handing over the responsibilities to their children. She also added new lines, and moved into fashion, and handbags, not just shoes. She died in 2018, aged ninety-six.
To our card, and there is a very interesting name on it, the printer, Courbe-Rouzet, of 23, Rue d`HauteviIle, in Paris. They also did printing for Liebig, and many others. Pierre Joseph Courbe was born in November 1831. At first he was destined to be a stonemason, like his father, but he turned the carving of stone into the carving of lithography. In the 1860s he met a man called Robelin, and they briefly teamed up. They printed labels, for the most part, for boxes of all kinds, from large packing crates to matchboxes. This soon expanded into advertising and trade cards.They seem to have parted on good terms though, as the patent was split between them. It appears that Robelin was simply moving to another location.
Courbe then opened a business under his own name at 142, Boulevard Saint-Denis, in Paris; this operated from 1879 until 1883, and then he moved to Rue d'Hauteville. He also got married in the 1890s, which is when the company name changed to Courbe-Rouzet. He died in 1912, but his nephew, Charles Rouzet, took the business over. It was closed in 1928.
I am not sure how many are in this set, but possibly two are left to find. The ones I do know, so far, are :
- Besoin Urgent [urgent need for mending - boy points down at shoe]
- Ca Va Comme un Gant [it fits like a glove - boy seated, leg on shoemaker`s lap]
- Pas de Place pour les Durillons [there is no unwanted space which forms calluses - boy stands on one leg showing sole to shoemaker]
- Preuve de la Soustraction [proof of subtraction (?) - shoemaker holds pair of boots, lower leg of boy running away out of right hand side of frame]