Toronto is famous for extraordinary museums with huge collections dedicated to the past and the present. For example, 40 galleries of the Royal Ontario Museum, which present exhibits from all over the world. Learn more at itoronto.
No less impressive and popular is the Toronto Bata Shoe Museum. It exhibits shoes from different eras. Collectors from all over the world want to visit this cultural institution because every corner of the museum reflects the traditions of a certain historical period. Among the exhibits, visitors can see shoes in which famous leaders conquered the world, appeared at solemn events, got married, performed on stage and played legendary compositions.
The collection includes about 13,000 exhibits, which are stored or permanently displayed. The museum organises temporary and travelling exhibitions, as well as conducts popularisation and educational programs.
History of the Bata Shoe Museum
The Bata Shoe Museum is located in the centre of Toronto, more precisely, on the northwest part of the University of Toronto main campus. The chief architect of the 3,665 m² building was a Canadian of Japanese origin, Raymond Moriyama. The firm Moriyama & Teshima Architects was involved in designing the museum too.
The unique collection preserves shoes that are more than 4,500 years old. Among the most interesting exhibits, a special place belongs to Elton John’s concert boots, Elvis Presley’s shoes, shoes of American leaders made of solid gold, Cinderella’s crystal shoes, Queen Victoria’s wedding shoes and the famous Chinese tiny shoes. Chinese aristocrats specially bandaged their feet to achieve the ideal foot length of 7.5 centimetres.
The museum was founded by Sonja Bata, the daughter of a rich Swiss lawyer. She devoted her whole life to collecting different types of shoes. The woman collected 1,500 pairs before her marriage, starting in the 1940s. She travelled with her husband Tomas Bata collecting shoes that symbolises the culture and traditions of various countries.
Tomas was gifted to Sonja by heaven because he was the owner of the Czech shoe company T.&A. Bat’a Shoe. The wife’s collection was filling up so quickly that it needed a separate room for storage and display. In 1979, the Bata family provided funds to establish the Bata Shoe Museum Foundation. Its aim was to professionally manage the collection, which was first shown to the public at the Colonnade shopping mall in 1992. The permanent museum opened on May 6, 1995. The building is estimated to cost from 8 to 12 million Canadian dollars.
The amazing exhibits with a thousand-year history
The four-story building resembles a huge shoebox from the outside. This is a real temple of fashion and the art of shoe-making. Shoes characterise not only their owner but also the entire era in which they lived. Shoes will indicate a person’s gender, activity, social status and the prevailing climate.
The oldest exhibit is a 4,000-year-old plaster cast of a leg, which was found on the territory of Tanzania. The exhibition presents the shoes of the ancient Egyptians and Romans, representatives of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance in chronological order. It is worth paying attention to the collection of shoes, which were owned by famous people, including politicians, show business stars, cultural figures, athletes, etc. Among all the variety, the most eye-catchy are Marilyn Monroe’s red shoes, in which she starred in the film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Princess Diana’s blue shoes, Napoleon’s black silk socks, Michael Jordan’s sneakers, French boots for crushing chestnuts, boots for walking on other planets and many other interesting exhibits.