We looked at a great number of Italian designers in class who have had a major impact on both the world market and on fashion history. The two that had the greatest reasonance with me were Salvatore Ferragamo and Guccio Gucci, founder of the House of Gucci. Both Gucci and Ferragamo have their roots in Florence, and both their museums are based here. They both have similar backgrounds and marketing techniques, but they are also very different in style and company history as well.
Salvatore Ferragamo, born in 1898, was a shoe designer who was based in Florence. He crafted his first pair of shoes for his sister at the age of nine. As a young man, he received training in both Italy and the United States to learn how to make shoes. Working out of California, he made valuable connections with many American celebrities and had a number of movie star clients, that stayed with him when he returned to Italy in 1927. His connection with Hollywood even allowed him to create the famous ruby red slippers from The Wizard of Oz in 1939. He had models of his clients' feet, including ones for Audrey Hepburn, Marilyn Monroe, Sophia Loren, and Greta Garbo, to name a few, in order to craft multiple pairs of perfectly fitting shoes.
Ferragamo had a great interest in anatomy, which was key in his search to create the most comfortable shoes. He was an innovator, creating a metal arch support from a special German steel. He also won a design award for a shoe design that used clear nylon to make portions of the shoe invisible, which we saw in the Ferragamo Museum in Florence. He liked to experiment with different materials to make his shoes, including leather made from fish skin.
In Florence, Ferragamo's company grew rapidly despite some financial issues. During the 1950s, he expanded to employing around 700 people in his workshop, that were able to produce around 350 pairs of shoes each day. After Ferragamo's death in 1960, his children took over the company and continued to expand it considerably over the years. Today it is run by two of his sons, and the products have grown to include women's and men's apparel and accessories, in addition to the women's shoes that they have always been known for.
Guccio Gucci, like Ferragamo, chose to make Florence the home for his business. Gucci got his start in leather goods, particularly saddles and saddlebags. He was born in Florence in 1881 to an Italian merchant family. He traveled a lot as a young man and was able to work as a bellhop in various hotels, an experience that gave him an intimate knowledge of high end luggage, which was also something he soon began selling in his Florence store. He employed skilled craftsmen and artisans to work in his workshop, much like Ferragamo.
During his time at the head of Gucci, the company expanded its products greatly, from luggage and saddles to things like shoes, handbags, scarves and much more. One of the most famous Gucci products was the bamboo bag, which is one of the longest selling and most successful designs in any company. Gucci also has a shoe design for a loafer that is the only shoe to be displayed in the Museum of Modern Art in New York. He later expanded his stores to Rome, then after his death, when his son took over, stores expanded to London, Paris, and New York.
The company was run by the family for years, and they they nearly drove the company into the ground with in-fighting and poor decisions. The family continued to fight during the 1980s, until the final member of the Gucci family still involved lost control in the 1990s. Tom Ford was made creative director of the company and helped to create a new image for them. He brought back classic pieces but also created a new image for the company. Today, Gucci is headed by Frida Giannini, who was formerly Gucci's accessories designer.
There are a considerable number of parallels to be found between these two brands. Both Ferragamo and Gucci are Italian designers who chose Florence as the place to open their first stores. They were also quiet ahead of most other Italian designers at the time as far as selling in the worldwide market. This was probably a result of their backgrounds. Both traveled as young men, receiving training and experience abroad, which gave them intimate knowledge of markets outside Italy. This also undoubtably helped them after the end of WWII. Both started in the accessories end, but their companies grew substaintially. A significant amount of growth in Gucci occurred while Guccio Gucci was still in charge. He expanded the products that Gucci produced considerably, from leather goods to things like shoes and scarves, and the company continued to expand after his death. In Ferragamo's case, most of the expansion occurred after his death. This is probably because he was so successful as a footwear designer and kept himself busy with that portion of the market.
Both companies are family companies. However, Ferragamo seems to have had much greater success as a family company than Gucci has. Gucci was plagued with problems of fighting in the family and greed, which nearly drove the company to bankruptcy. Ferragamo was not free of its problems, either, and the company filed for bankruptcy in 1933, but Ferragamo bounced back and became stronger than ever. His children also proved to be adept at running the company, much more so than in the Gucci family. While Ferragamo's sons still run the company, Gucci has long since been in other hands.
Getting to see both companies' museums here in Florence provided great insight into both the creative visions of these two designers as well as insight into the way their companies were run and their brands marketed. At the Ferragamo museum, we saw the innovation and creative genius of Ferragamo on display. His shoes were initially marketed on the idea of exclusivity and individualism, as evidenced by his celebrity clientel. At Gucci, the company was very much about the idea of creating a wide array of products for all aspects of their customer's lifestyles.
Of the two companies, I was definitely most influenced by Salvatore Ferragamo. Ferragamo was very much an inventive mind. The things that he created were immensely creative and had a timeless quality to them. One of my favorite pieces from the museum was the cage heel shoe, because it looked very modern despite being several decades old. There is a lot of experimentation with new materials today that does not even compare to what Ferragamo was doing 60 years ago. I thought it was interesting that he used fish skin to make shoes, and it was being shown at Premiere Vision like it was a new idea. Ferragamo's study of anatomy to make better shoes is also something to be admired and modeled after. Ferragamo is a company that is classically Italian and subtle.
That is not to say, however, that I was not also influenced by Gucci. Gucci definitely seems to subscribe to the "go big or go home" school of thought when it comes to design and to their business. They started big in the early days, quickly expanding their business to be much more than simply leather goods, and I think the fact that their name is so widely known today is a direct result of that early growth. Gucci is immensely focused on getting their name out there, and it has clearly benefitted them because their name is synonymous with so much more than simply high end leather goods today.
Both of these companies are fairly similar in their backgrounds. Gucci and Ferragamo are proudly Florentine, having traveled the world and decided that this was the best city for them to have their businesses in. I am definitely influenced by the home-town pride that these two display, as well as their designs. Both men were design innovators and creative geniuses. Ferragamo had several patents in his lifetime related to things he created for his shoes. They were also both talented businessmen, who entered the world market well before most other Italian designers did. Both serve as great examples of both classic Italian design.
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