• Jersey Boys: Now until September 12, 2010
• Steam Whistle Brewery Tours: Now until Oct. 30 2010
• The Bata Shoe Museum
• Stratford Shakespeare Festival
• Toronto Concerts
• Toronto Theatre

Put Your Best Foot Forward at the Bata Shoe Museum

The Bata Shoe Museum of Toronto is offering one of the most delightful views of footwear history to guests of all ages through September 10, 2010, in its On a Pedestal From Renaissance Chopines to Baroque Heels exhibit. The exhibit features outrageous Renaissance and Baroque footwear from the 1500s through the 1800s. The collection will astound and delight visitors as they try to imagine walking a mile in extreme and baffling footwear.

On a Pedestal: From Renaissance Chopines to Baroque Heels showcases artifacts on loan from world-class collections, including Castello Sforzesco (Milan), Museo Bardini (Florence), Ambras Castle (Austria), Victoria and Albert Museum (London) and the Royal Ontario Museum (Toronto) just to name a few.

Visitors are sure to be impressed and intrigued with this collection of bizarre and beautiful footwear from the past. A pair of 16th century Venetian Chopines, precursors to the modern day platform sole, is an astounding 50 cm tall! Birdlike velvet Chopine from 1600 Italy feature elegant tassels and lace, making them appear less like foot protection and more a work of luxurious art.

Fanciful, functional, and fantastic, On a Pedestal: From Renaissance Chopines to Baroque Heels offers locals and tourists alike the opportunity to experience a side of human history often taken for granted or ignored completely. The connection to modern style is barely evident in the styles and social status seen in the shoes, boots and sandals of the past.

On a Pedestal: From Renaissance Chopines to Baroque Heels, offers an accessible, entertaining, and enlightening perspective of our shared past as shoe wearers, members of society, and that odd characteristic of human behavior that requires art, color, and style in everything we do.

Toronto visitors are sure to enjoy a stop at the Bata Shoe Museum to see On a Pedestal: From Renaissance Chopines to Baroque Heels for themselves. These artifacts are far more extreme than anything seen today. Even those who are generally not attracted to history will find this exhibit enjoyable and informative.