Toronto, Canada’s Bata Shoe Museum recently announced the launch of their new spring exhibition called Exhibit A: Investigating Crime and Footwear. It opened on April 18, 2024 and will run for a total of 18 months.
The exhibition explores the fascinating history of footwear forensics in helping to solve crime. The display also examines criminality from the 19th century to modern day and delves into how clothing and shoes have impacted cultural norms.
“Footwear can be incriminating on multiple levels,” says Elizabeth Semmelhack, Director and Senior Curator, Bata Shoe Museum. “The ‘wrong’ choice of shoe can lead to suspicion while footprints left behind can lead to detention. This exhibition explores the wide range of ways in which crime and footwear intersect.”
The “exchange principle,” developed more than a century ago by famous French criminologist Edmond Locard, postulated that items recovered from crime scenes were more authentic and trustworthy than eyewitness accounts. Although many believed that witnesses might lie or forget details of an event, stains, fibers, and footprints were objective evidence of guilt or innocence. Although clothes, and particularly shoes, can provide crucial hints in criminal cases, their significance in actual crimes and the people we mistakenly identify as criminals is far more nuanced. With the help of this exhibition, visitors will be able to piece together the intricate yet crucial function that shoes play in crime, law enforcement, and the judicial system.
“Whether the footwear in Exhibit A was worn to elude capture, smuggle tools, project glamour, provide employment in prison, used as evidence in court or as a weapon, it has literally left its mark on the history of criminal investigation”, says Alison Matthews David, Professor, School of Fashion, Toronto Metropolitan University. “We hope that this exhibition offers you the opportunity to sleuth out your own clues to the mysteries held within these fascinating and often troubling objects.”
Some Exhibition Highlights
FLANNELFOOT (on loan from the Crime Museum of New Scotland Yard, London, UK) The first ever loan of this burglar’s kit made by Scotland Yard, Flannelfoot is considered London’s most infamous home burglar. Henry Edward Vickers, dubbed the “Flannel Foot,” was an infamous 25-year veteran of small-time crime until Scotland Yard police eventually apprehended him in 1937. Vickers was noted for hiding his footprints by wrapping flannel cloths or socks around his feet. His bag contained rubber galoshes with unique soles to keep his shoes free of suspicious muck, gloves to prevent fingerprints, and tools to cut glass windows.
19TH CENTURY CUT-OUT BOOTS
In the past, a love of refinement and seductive demeanor was frequently connected to female criminality, with clothing having a significant influence on how society views women. Excessively high heels and garish attire revealing too much skin were frequently seen as indicators of immorality. It was thought that an unbridled love for fashion may push women towards crimes ranging from stealing to murder.
HOBNAIL BOOTS
Before the use of fingerprinting and DNA, footprints were a key tool in finding criminals. Hobnail boots, commonly used by working-class men, used nails in the soles for durability and traction, and were considered useful as evidence because each shoemaker used their own unique nails.
Exhibition Related Programming
April 20 and 21 – Community Weekend – Free Admission all weekend
April 27 – Dramatic Soles – a Crime-Inspired Play-writing Workshop
June 5 – Classic Crime Movie Trivia
July 17 – Exhibit A Paint Night
July 24 – Stephen King Trivia Night Pt.1
August 21 – Stephen King Trivia Night Pt. 2