Happy feet

Diego Della Valle shuns mass production and has turned a small, family shoe business into a billion-dollar brand

Diego Della Valle shuns mass production, values quality and the Italian way, and has turned a small, family shoe business into a billion-dollar brand

Despite the typical trappings of an Italian tycoon – the Ferrari, the football team and the fashion label – Diego Della Valle insists he has not grown too big for his pebble-soled boots. “I try to live a simple life,” says the easygoing industrialist who built his father’s shoe factory into a global designer brand, Tod’s. “It’s very important to have a normal sense of life, according to our Italian traditions and family values.”

Derek Lam, the hip Chinese-American designer Della Valle hired in late 2006 as the company’s first creative director, chuckles at his boss’s notion of normality. “They’re really humble,” Lam notes of the Della Valle clan. “They’re not going to tell you they’re staying in the Mediterranean with movie and rock stars, or that Eric Clapton’s coming to dinner. They’re very rooted, and are proud of that.”

Like so many of his compatriots, Della Valle spends Sunday afternoons screaming himself hoarse at the soccer stadium. But then, he does own one of the Series A teams, Fiorentina. Like any other Italian papa, he enjoys sharing a platter of pasta with his family on weekends – albeit on the Marlin, the JFK presidential yacht that he bought at a Christie’s auction. Even though he sits on the board of Ferrari, Della Valle professes not to drive the red sports machine gleaming in his garage, opting to dart around his extensive estate in a zippy Fiat 500. He does, however, make use of a private jet (decked out, only naturally, in Tod’s tan leather livery), his own helicopter and a chauffeur.

Despite his extraordinary lifestyle, the 54-year-old entrepreneur seems immune to the flashy fickleness of fashion, an industry in which he is one of Italy’s most powerful players. At Milan Fashion Week, he shuns the cocktails-and-concerts circuit for an elegant presentation at the Pavilion of Contemporary Art, where the handcrafted shoes and bags sit on spotlit plinths like soft sculptures. As the habitually hungry fashionistas swarm over a buffet of Italian delicacies, Della Valle, conspicuous in his owlish glasses, collar-length hairdo and conservative suit, works the room. “I grew up watching my father work, and learning from him what good quality is,” he tells WISH. “I took from him the passion to create beautiful and exclusive products. He also taught me to persevere if I want to reach my goals.” Money, counsels Della Valle, is nothing without talent, dreams and perseverance.

Diego’s grandfather, Filippo, was a cobbler in Cassette d’Ete, a town in the Le Marche region of northeastern Italy. He taught his skills to his son Dorino, who built a small but solid family business selling shoes to department stores. It was the ambitious Diego who, after a stint in the United States in his early 20s, showed the commercial nous to build the company into a business that last year racked up sales exceeding $1 billion. Rifling through the Boston phone directory in 1975, the law student turned entrepreneur came up with a memorable new brand name.

“I was looking for a name with an old English sound, very easy to pronounce in every language and easy to remember,” he explains. “At the beginning I used J. P. Tod’s, but then in 1999 it was shortened since too many people were asking who was Mr J. P. Tod’s.” Similarly, the brand name Hogan, Tod’s trendy youth line, was chosen because it sounded American.

 “I love and admire the American culture and the American dream,” Della Valle says of his stint Stateside. “I learnt so many things about the American shoe industry and marketing strategies. I caught the secrets of American casual wear, that is elegant and wearable, retro and modern, and mixed it with an Italian touch, luxurious and handmade.”

Della Valle idolises John F. Kennedy, whose portrait watches over him in his office at the 16,000sqm shoe factory in Le Marche. His other “hero” is dad Dorino who, at 82, still stalks the factory floor to check the quality is up to scratch.

The family ethos of perfection and perseverance has paid off. Despite Tod’s SpA being floated on the Milan stock exchange in 2000, Della Valle retains a two-thirds stake and still regards the company (which also owns the Hogan, Fay and Roger Vivier labels) as a family business; he is chairman of the board and brother Andrea is vice-chairman. Eldest son Emanuele, 33, works as a director, despite having horrified his father by dropping out of business school to follow the 1995 America’s Cup challenge in San Diego, where he confesses to having “slammed a few beers” with the Aussie crew.

At a time when many rival luxury brands are moving manufacturing to cheap-labour locations such as China and India, Della Valle insists on Italian production. “Made in Italy is not just a label but a way of life,” he quips. “I come from a family with a long tradition in shoemaking and I still live in a region famous for its shoemakers.” Ninety per cent of Italian shoes originate from Le Marche’s 2000 factories. “It is getting harder and harder to find skilled workers,” Della Valle laments. “There are no professional training institutes, so we have to train our own employees. And an apprenticeship takes three years.”

Tod’s employs 1600 workers – third-generation cobblers among them – in its sleek and sprawling factory of glass and steel, which incorporates a creche and a gym. The brand’s handbags are crafted in a small factory just outside Florence. “You could never hope to control quality if you fielded out production to China,” he argues. “You must have consistency and no short cuts.

"There are more than 100 steps to assembling a Tod’s handmade shoe and each step is controlled by a skilled artisan. I think Chinese people are tireless workers and I admire their quick development but I would not transfer my production there. My roots are in Italy and I will continue to produce in my country.” Della Valle considers China more of an opportunity than a threat to business and plans to open 12 new mainland stores this year.

His championing of Italian industry has not always been appreciated. Italy’s prime minister, the scandal-prone billionaire Silvio Berlusconi, called for a boycott of Tod’s shoes after Della Valle heckled him at a meeting of Italian industrialists during the 2006 election campaign. As could happen only in Italy, journalists then grilled politicians about their preferred brand of footwear, noting that some of Berlusconi’s closest advisers were shod in Tod’s.

Hired to give the label a midlife makeover, Derek Lam has brought new street cred to Tod’s, making it as popular with celebrities as it is with well-heeled housewives. The casual-chic style has impressed the likes of actors Sarah Jessica Parker and Angelina Jolie, and French first lady Carla Bruni who – perhaps in deference to her husband’s Napoleonic stature – picked a pair of Tod’s ballerina flats to wear on the couple’s debut visit to Britain.

“For me it comes down to Anglo-American sportiness, crossed with the Italian sensuality and love of life,” says Lam of his design philosophy. “More and more people are looking for informality, sometimes in a formal setting.” In a way, Della Valle is his muse. “Diego lives in an old monastery – decorated beautifully and simply – on Capri, where I stayed last summer,” Lam explains. “They served prosciutto and melon and it was so simple, so perfect. It overwhelmed the senses because it was not about seeing a million dollars in front of you.”

Under Lam’s design direction, the classic moccasin has morphed into pebble-soled wedges and shiny patent Mary-Janes. Retro racing stripes give a sportier style to men’s computer bags and briefcases, while blue suede shoes and lizard-skin loafers are suited to weekends as well as workdays. Lam has also introduced a range of clothing that features sleek, chic trench coats and biker jackets crafted in supple suede.

Pride in fine workmanship and an appreciation of aesthetics “is something in the DNA” of Italians, Lam believes. “Diego is very strongly cultivating the history and artisanship, even in something as humble as shoes and bags, with incredible pride,” he says. “It’s not just rubber-stamped out of a factory. He’s not going to present something that he doesn’t feel is in the scope of great quality. You wouldn’t catch an Italian chef presenting you with pasta that isn’t cooked properly.”

It is the very nature of fashion that design often overrides function – stilettos with ankle-snapping heels and slippery soles, leathers too delicate to take out in the rain, and handbags too tiny to fit both a wallet and a mobile phone. Yet Della Valle insists his products be practical. Hence most of the shoes bear the brand’s trademark “pebbled” rubber non-slip soles, inspired by Italian racing drivers’ shoes, while handbags feature ­comfortable straps and pickpocket-proof zips.

“Tod’s consumers have money and good taste but they also have busy lives,” Della Valle reasons. “They work, they travel across the world and need beautiful and exclusive but also functional things. And that is what we give them.” Lam and sometimes the boss himself will road-test new shoes to check the comfort and quality before they are put into production. “Internally we test everything, and not just with technicians,” says Lam. “We really have the luxury of taking the time and making sure everything feels right. (Diego’s) best advice is to be focused, to really hone in on the design and don’t let a momentary seasonal change or ad campaign change you.”

Tod’s has been scouting for a suitable location for its first Australian boutique – in Sydney – for the past couple of years. “I haven’t been in Australia yet but I would love to visit it in the near future,” Della Valle says. “I met some Australian people and like their sense of business and initiative.” Lam stayed in Sydney for the Mardi Gras parade a decade ago and was “dumbstruck” by the resemblance to his hometown of San Francisco: “Everybody’s so relaxed,” he says.

A fanatical yachtsman, Della Valle might feel right at home, too. “As soon as I can, I love to spend my free time travelling on my boat,” he enthuses. “For me it is a good way to relax and have fun.” And what else makes him happy? “The little but precious things of daily life,” he muses. “The smile of my son, the job of my employees, a dish of spaghetti and a glass of chilled wine – and when Fiorentina wins a match!”

So, it seems that Italian fashion’s high-flyer does have his feet on the ground after all.