The “Sex and the City” ladies should have traveled to Italy for shoes, to Stra, near Venice to be precise. 

In this area, scattered with Venetian Villas, an artisan in 1942 Narciso Rossi started a small workshop of women’s shoes—initially probably limited to a production of one or two pairs a day.

 The small shoe factory of a few artisans—whose precious hand-making was handed down from father to son—evolved in 1947 into Rossimoda.

The Rossi brothers would soon obtain the licenses to produce luxury footwear for the most famous names on the international high fashion scene: from Charles Jourdan to Christian Dior and Yves St Laurent (1963), from Givenchy ( 1973) to Ungaro (1979), from Calvin Klein to Fendi (1991).

The shoes museum, located in the main complex of the villa is a joy to visit. 

An history of shoes displayed in two floors of this beautiful villa. 

The exposition starts with a little history of footwear, with some models brought back from China by Marco Polo. A necessity in (back then) very dirty Venetian Calle, though quite difficult to walk on, especially in Venice. Then the more sophisticated slippers and shoes for the nobles. 

All the ups and downs of fashion. The boots, high heels, flats, precious evening shoes, to the first car shoe made by Porche, yes, the car!

 

Including the impossible designs such as the “no-heel-high-heel” wanted by Karl Lagerfeld for Fendi. 

Everything was there, from the delicate elegant Christian Dior to the innovative YSL.

In 2003 the French luxury financial group LVMH acquires control of Rossimoda.

Villa Foscarini Rossi
Via Doge Pisani 1
30039 Stra VE
Tel. +39 049 9800335
Fax +39 049 9801589

Museo della Calzatura
Tel. – Fax +39 049 9801091 
www.museodellacalzatura.it