Bata Shoe Museum Outing     April 24, 2024 

Organized by:    Andrea Kovacs

Five shoe enthusiasts set out to the Bata Shoe Museum in Toronto.

Bata Shoe Museum is home to the world’s larges collection of shoes and footwear-related objects.  

The permanent collection contains artifacts from virtually every culture in the world.

 

The start of the museum holds the archaeological collection which includes footwear from some of the earliest civilizations on earth.

During our visit we saw a comprehensive collection of historic and contemporary fashion footwear ranging from the Italian Renaissance to the catwalks of today’s designers.  

 

The museum also holds an extensive collection of Indigenous North American and Circumpolar footwear.

Currently the Feature exhibit at the museum is “Investigating Crime and Footwear”,

which examines the development in footwear forensics and a means of solving crime and the social constructions of criminality from the 19^th century to the present.

The 20^th century “gum shoe” detective holding a magnifying glass to examine 

foot prints has become an enduring symbol of investigation.

Soft felt soles of a Parisian cat-burglar were designed to slip over a thief’s street shoes to muffle their steps.

The last exhibit was Flowers and Footwear which consisted of representation of flowers on fashion such as the wedding shoes decorated with sprigs of orange blossoms made of was worn by Torontonian Mary Evelyn Nicol for her wedding in 1929.

The museum also houses Cinderella’s glass slippers and some of Barbie’s shoe collection.

Not to forget, a pair of French Chestnut Crushing boots that could double as old school icers.

To finish our day, we crossed the street and headed to the Fortunate Fox Pub for some grub.