THROUGHOUT THE 1940S, wedge heel shoes—also known as “wedgies” or “lifties”—dominated feminine shoe fashion, and they have remained popular ever since. They were patented by Salvatore Ferragamo (1898-1960), “the shoemaker of dreams,” and the success ofthe design depended on a lucky combination of form and function. Ferragamo was born in a poor peasant family from a small village outside Naples, but worked in Hollywood and eventually became one of the most influential shoemakers in the 20th Century by making extravagant shoes for celebrities. However, the Ferragamo wedge does not owe its genesis to the lavish lifestyles of movie royalty, but to the troubled economic reality of Italy between the wars, and a strategic emphasis on patenting that was ahead of its time.

Salvatore Ferragamo was born in the small southern Italian village ofBonito. He began making shoes at the age of 10 and, at the age of 15, he moved to the United States to join his siblings who ran a shoerepair shop in Santa Barbara, California. In the period before World War I, Santa Barbara was one of the main capitals of the American film industry, and young Salvatore began designing shoes for historical films. He was gifted: he knew what shoes would fit the styles of historical film productions, but he made them modern in both fit and material. When the American Film Company moved to Hollywood in 1919, Ferragamo followed suit. Producing shoes that didn't harm the foot ofthe wearer obsessed him, and he attended anatomy class at the University of Southern California with the purpose of adapting his shoes to the human foot, instead of forcing the foot to adapt to the shoe. As a result, Ferragamo became very popular among film people, making shoes not only for the movies but also for the stars’ private use, and many of his famous movie clients became his personal friends.

In 1927 Ferragamo returned to Italy. After some difficult years during the Depression he managed to get his business together again, and by 1938 he had moved his shop to Palazzo Spini Ferroni in Florence— the headquarters ofthe Ferragamo family business to this day.