The Salvatore Ferragamo Museum is open to the public from Monday to Friday, from 9 am to 1 pm, and from 2 pm to 6 p.m. It is closed on Good Friday and Easter Monday, and from the 1st to the 31st of August, and from the 23rd of December to the 6th of January. There is no entrance fee and all the visits are guided, either in English or in Italian. A maximum of thirty people at a time is allowed, and telephone or fax booking is required. Situated in Florence, on the second floor of Palazzo Spini Feroni, via Tornabuoni no.2, the museum was opened to the public in 1995 by the Ferragamo family, in an effort to illustrate Ferragamo's artistic qualities and the important role he played in the history of the shoe design and international fashion. Besides photographs patents, sketches, books, magazines and wooden lasts of famous feet, the museum host a collection of over 10.000 models designed by Ferragamo from the end of the 1920's until 1960, the year of his death. Salvatore Ferragamo dedicated his life to the search for a secret; the shoe that fits well. When he began studying human anatomy in the United States he found his first clue to the problem, in the distribution of the body's weight over the joints of the foot. Shoes worn by the pop star Madonna, in the film Evita. The design was based on the original, created by Salvatore Ferragamo for Evita Peron. In 1999, the Guggenheim First Prize for Industry and Culture was awarded to Salvatore Ferrgamo for its decision to invest in culture.

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• Salvatore Ferragamo