Long before becoming synonymous as one of the world’s top designers of haute couture footwear, Salvatore Ferragamo gained fame as shoe designer to Hollywood stars. Creating gorgeous and unique designs that also comfortably fit the wearer’s foot, Ferragamo put Hollywood on the map as a design capital for couture in the 1920s.
Born June 5, 1898, in the tiny town of Bonito, Italy as the eleventh of fourteen children to a poor farming family, young Ferragamo left school at 9 to begin working to help support them. Though he worked for short times for a tailor, barber, and carpenter, the inquisitive, observant youngster found himself drawn to shoemaking, realizing immediately that he “was born to be a shoemaker.” When his sister needed a pair of white shoes for confirmation, the 9-year-old purchased materials, secretly stayed up all night, and created an elegant pair that impressed everyone. Continue reading
Long before Los Angeles or Hollywood possessed any historic preservation organizations fighting to save architectural, cultural or historically significant buildings, Los Angeles Times Editor and Publisher Harry S. Chandler astutely summed up what preservation is all about: saving structures that help define a sense of identity and place, showing where we as a society and people come from.
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