The name Tod’s recalls luxury, the Italianness and another element: the gommino. This typical element of the loafer’s sole has become the emblem of Della Valle Company. Everything started in a small village of the Marche Region, in the middle of Italy, where Diego Della Valle, CEO of the brand, has grown up in the little of his grand-father Filippo, an artisan who used to draw and produce shoes.
After studying Law, while he was travelling in the United States, Diego entered a store in Manhattan’s East End and discovered a pair of driving loafers: here he had this intuition. Turning those loafers into an original walking shoe. We are in the Seventies and Diego, already part of the family company next to his father, creates the gommino, a very light loafer, entirely handstitched and characterised by a sole studded by 133 rubber spheres. A brand is needed to launch this gommino: here is the origin of the name Tod’s, choosen by reading the Boston’s phone book. A simple name, incisive and in the meantime international. Another intuition: a brand that echoes the American dream but with a completely Italian background.
The gommino becomes the symbol of a casual chic elegance and it spreads out in Italy and worldwide thanks to businessmen, movie stars and celebrities: from the lawyer Gianni Agnelli to the King of Spain Juan Carlos, going through Michael Douglas, Gwyneth Paltrow e Julia Roberts. To confirm the success and the versatility of this loafer’s model, in 2014 Tod’s launched a campaign called Dots of life where fashion bloggers were invited to post pictures of their style: elegant, classic, but also sportswear and more casual, wearing a Tod’s gommino.
Thanks to a complex handcrafted production that requires one hundred work steps and may include up to thirty five pieces of leather, the gommino has become a trademark, an icon and a status symbol.
Combining high quality materials (very selected leathers), a high handcrafted savoir-faire (handmade manufacturing) with a modern and new design, Tod’s has succeeded in conquering the luxury market and in establishing itself as a model of the Made in Italy elegance all over the world. Tod’s group, that counts today also the younger brands Hogan, the sportswear shoes, Fay, the ready-to-wear brand and the French brand Roger Vivier, women shoes, is also quoted on the stock exchange.
