The latest arrival from the historic Florentine house is a colourful new series of sneakers, combining vintage inspirations, high-tech materials and sustainable construction

Salvatore Ferragamo’s vintage-inspired sneakers. Courtesy of Salvatore Ferragamo

For almost a century, the Florentine house of Salvatore Ferragamo has provided an array of luxurious and ever-evolving footwear for its international devotees – from the dramatic (a 1938 golden sandal with vertiginous rainbow wedge heel for Hollywood royalty Judy Garland) to the quotidien (their leather loafer, with signature Gancini buckle, which remains one the house’s most enduring styles). 

The latest arrivals, revealed this week, hope to take a similar place in the Ferragamo canon: an elegant new series of sneakers, which meld the house’s extraordinary dedication to craft with the comfort and ease of traditional running shoes. Designed to be worn across genders, they riff on vintage designs from the 1960s and 1970s, albeit reimagined in contemporary style, utilising high-tech fabrications and a bold and vivid use of colour (in another nod to the past, one rainbow-hued sole references the aforementioned house classic worn by Garland). Another is decorated with the 1950s-designed Gancini emblem, a motif drawn from the looping wrought-iron hooks originally made to tether horses on the historic Palazzo Ferragamo in Florence, where the house is based.

But the varied models offer more than simply aesthetically pleasing design; instead, they also arrive with serious sustainable credentials – or, in the house’s words, a ‘responsible essence’. Crafted using ‘a mix of high-tech and responsible materials’, each pair is crafted from an Econyl upper (Ecoynl is 100 percent regenerated from fishing nets and nylon waste), suede inserts from manufacturing scraps, and leather which utilises a chrome-free tanning process. Elsewhere, threads are constructed from 100 percent post-consumer recycled polyester, while felt details are also made from recycled polyester fibres. 

A feeling of lightness and comfort – defining principles of the entirety of Ferragamo’s near-century-long output – completes the various sneakers, each style finished with a customised tread, from heel to toe. §

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