The Bata shoe Museum

The Bata shoe Museum

This location I thought is a perfect place to include in this ANT450 project for no other reason other than the fact that I love shoes and what better way to write a 2 page paper but on something I love and I get to visit a place that is filled with all sorts of footwear from around the world. Bata and Shoes are synonymous for people like me in Canada who like / loves shoes. Bata is a shoe company and the museum came about because of Sonja Bata who collected shoes from everywhere she went with her husband as he travelled he globe on business as part of the Bata Shoe Company.  The collection started in the 1940s and the current location was opened in May 1995. The Museum is located just further down the street from the ROM (Royal Ontario Museum) on Bloor Street at the corner of St. George Street; its main entrance is on Bloor Street and right at the north area of the University of Toronto.

I am sure others might disagree but for me the building that house the Bata museum from the outside just reminds me of a typical structure found in any metropolitan city, concrete and glass building. What interests me about this building is not its shape and size and what it is made of but simply what it houses, shoes! The museum is organized into 4 sections or main exhibits as it were: - Beauty, Identity, Pride: Native North American Footwear, - All about Shoes, - Collected in the Field: Shoemaking Stories from Around the World and - Out of the Box: The Rise of Sneaker Culture. The museum boasts that its permanent collection is made up of “artifacts from virtually every culture in the world”.

One of the most popular exhibits that the museum houses though is its collection of celebrity footwear which includes shoes worn by and from celebrities such as Elton John, John Lennon and Elvis Presley and Queen Victoria. I found it quite surprisingly spacious inside the opposite of what I expected from the outside, there are a lot of shoes on display here, and its international collection alone consists of over 12,500 items. Other than displaying beautiful and interesting footwear from around the world one of the main purchase of the museum is to sponsors and conducts research for the understanding of the role shoes play in differing cultures and life of people around the world.

While at the museum I found it interesting that there were shoes that span the history of humans. There were shoes that were prehistoric made I believe what I identify as grass was used to make it. There were what is considered item from end of the other spectrum, shoes by Christian Louboutin displayed on glass to highlight and show their signature red soles. While I was there the current temporary exhibition is the Out of the Box: The Rise of Sneaker Culture currently on until the first of June 2014 and is also associated to a “design a sneaker” competition open to Toronto school students from grades 7 though 12. This temporary display and competition is just one in the many activities the museum organizes and conducts on an ongoing basis to keep interests ongoing in the museum. 

The Museum is relatively easy to find, as it is located in a central part of the city and on the subway line. Admission is reasonably priced and also offer discounted rates from seniors, students and family prices. This makes it more accessible to people with less disposable income. The museum is also open later on Thursdays, which would allow more people and option of attending. The museum I think does a good job of bringing other cultures to the city if only in the form of shoes. It is a reflection of the city and the city and the many cultures that makes up its cultural mosaic and therefore a reflection of multiculturalism and globalization.