I was packing for our trip to Italy last month when I recognized a hole in my wardrobe. At 39 and…read more10 months, I didn't own a go-to pair of grown-up pumps. I knew exactly what I wanted: black, leather, with a pointy toe and a reasonable but non-negligible heel. Shoes to take into my 40s. I had a feeling I might find a pair in Italy, and actually walked into the Prada store in Florence to check out a pair I'd scouted online. They were too expensive and too pointy, but I knew they were in the right ballpark.
I went to Salvatore Ferragamo a few hours later, in large part because we were staying at the Hotel Lungarno, owned by the Ferragamo family, and had 10% off any purchases at the store. My husband was looking for a belt, too, and we figured it was worth popping in for a browse.
Salvatore Ferragamo is a Florence label, it turns out, and this store is its global flagship. It's in a literal Gothic palace, the Palazzo Spini Feroni, purchased by Salvatore Ferragamo himself in the 1930s. The building also houses the company headquarters and the Salvatore Ferragamo Museum.
The store was spacious and attractive, with room after room of Ferragamo goods. It was pretty quiet when we walked in, close to 7:00 on a cold Tuesday night, and we were able to browse for a while without anyone taking notice of us. We looked at some men's shoes and belts, but they were a little obviously branded for my normcore husband.
Then I walked into the women's shoe room and saw my perfect pump displayed on one of the shelves: black, leather, with a pointy toe and a reasonable but non-negligible heel. The leather was soft and beautiful, the Ferragamo branding limited to a small gold detail at the back of each ankle. There was a patent leather version, too, which I also quite liked.
I tried on the display shoes for size and a security guy asked if I needed someone to help me. He went and retrieved a young sales associate named Veronica, who brought me available sizes for both the leather and patent leather pumps, as well as the leather in another color. Unfortunately, she told me, they didn't have the black leather pair in stock in my preferred size. I asked if I could order it through the store and maybe pick it up in Rome, where I'd be staying later in the week, and she told me that was impossible. I looked it up myself and saw the shoes were all but sold out in my size in Italy.
Strangely, there appeared to be one pair in the Florence store, but when Veronica went to get it, it turned out to be the same model shoe in brown suede. I was ready to give up, and had started selling myself on the patent leather--it was a great shoe, and a good price with the detax and the Hotel Lungarno discount--when Veronica came back, very excited, carrying my shoes. It occurred to her that the brown shoes might have been switched with the black ones, and she went back to check quietly, without getting my hopes up. I was thrilled, and she seemed genuinely happy for both of us.
It took a while to make the purchase, which required making an account with Ferragamo and filling stuff out for both the tax refund and the extra 10% discount. (I did, of course, immediately start getting emails, but it was easy enough to hit unsubscribe.) In the end, though, I had my new favorite heels, for about 30% less than I would have paid at home. A wonderful souvenir, too, from the Florence home of a global house.
