History under your feet – 3000 years of shoes

Special shoe exhibition at the Spielzeug Welten Museum in Basel from 18 October 2014 – 6 April 2015, in collaboration with the Northampton Museum and Art Gallery from England and the Virtual Shoe Museum. This special exhibition is devoted to an everyday object that for millennia has served to protect the soles of men, women and children: the shoe.

In collaboration with the Northampton Museums and Art Gallery in England, home to the world’s largest collection of historical shoes, this exhibition of over 220 pairs of shoes takes you on a journey through the footwear fashions of the last 3000 years. In addition to its purely protective function and its importance for many people as a fashion item, throughout history the shoe has also been connected with social status and membership of particular social groups. In ancient Egypt, only pharaohs were allowed to wear sandals made of silver or gold. The oldest shoe in the exhibition comes from Egypt, and dates from around 1000 BC. Every shoe form that we wear today has a link to the past. We are always wearing a piece of history on our feet. And in the meantime, the shoe has also become a subject for the art world.

More than 30 artists from across the globe, selected by Liza Snook from The Virtual Shoe Museum, have made their artistic shoe creations available for the exhibition. Shoes from the designers of tomorrow also offer visitors a taste of the future.

Thomas Murphy, an English shoemaker of bespoke shoes for the young and old, will demonstrate his craft on various weekends. Our visitors will have the chance to experience live how handmade shoes are made today, and will have the opportunity to try their hand at a bit of shoemaking themselves.

Spielzeug Welten Museum Basel (Toy Worlds Museum Basle)
Museum, shop and restaurant
Opening hours 10.00 until 18.00 daily
Steinenvorstadt 1
CH-4051 Basel

The Swiss Museums Pass and the Museums-PASS-Musées are valid for the Toy Worlds Museum Basle.

Admission.
CHF 7.00/5.00
Children up to 16 years of age are admitted free of charge and only the company of adults.

Beads shoes by Tomas Kroes, photo by Charlotte Visser.