Tod's

Tod’s is an Italian luxury house founded in the Marche region in the 1920s, and it is best known for the Gommino, the driving shoe with 133 rubber pebbles set into its sole. They grip a pedal, and they let the sole flex so the shoe feels like a glove rather than a boot.

We keep coming back to this house because it does one thing extremely well and has resisted the pull to become a fashion brand instead. The Gommino’s construction has barely changed since it launched in 1979.

Behind the brand

History of Tod’s

The story starts with a small shoemaking workshop that Filippo Della Valle opened in the Marche in the 1920s, in a part of Italy that has made footwear for centuries. His son Dorino built it into a proper manufacturing business supplying other labels.

Diego Della Valle, Filippo’s grandson, took over in the 1970s and did the two things that made the modern company. He created the Gommino in 1979, and he named the brand J.P. Tod’s after a name he found in a Boston telephone directory, chosen because it was short and pronounceable in every language. He later shortened it to Tod’s.

The company grew into a group that also owns Roger Vivier, Hogan and Fay, and it listed on the Milan exchange in 2000. It left the market again in 2024, when the Della Valle family took it private with backing from the L Catterton fund and LVMH. The family keeps control with a majority stake, L Catterton holds about 36% and LVMH 10%. In 2011 Diego Della Valle also pledged 25 million euros to restore the Colosseum, an unusually direct piece of corporate patronage, with the work beginning in 2013.

The Gommino and the Tod’s collection

The Gommino is the house. Its sole and heel carry 133 rubber pebbles that wrap up the back of the heel, and that wrap is the detail people recognize from across a room. It comes in smooth leather and in suede, in a lower classic profile and in the taller City Gommino, and in men’s and women’s cuts. Recent collections have added a chunkier bubble sole to the line, though the original flat version remains the one most people picture.

Beyond the driving shoe are the loafers, the desert boots and the Chelsea boots, all made on the same soft, hand-finished lasts. The leather goods line is led by the Di Bag and the T Timeless range, and it carries the same restraint as the shoes, with clean shapes and no loud hardware. Ready-to-wear exists but stays secondary, and most buyers come to Tod’s for the shoes first.

We cover the driving shoe in our guide to the best driving shoes for men, where the Gommino remains our reference point for the category, and it earns a place in our men’s loafers guide too.

Craftsmanship and materials

The Gommino is made from a single piece of leather wherever possible, hand-stitched, with the pebbled rubber sole applied so it wraps up the back of the heel. Production stays in the Marche at the company’s own factory, where Tod’s has made footwear for generations.

The leathers are soft, unlined and meant to mold to the foot. That construction is the reason the shoe is so comfortable, and also the reason it is not built for long days on concrete. The pebbles wear down on pavement, though a specialist can replace the sole.

Where to buy Tod’s

Tod’s sells through its own boutiques, its official site, department stores and luxury etailers. Sizing runs narrow and the unlined leather stretches with wear, so buying a half size down from your usual is common advice worth testing in person before you commit.

Tod’s price

Tod’s prices in the middle of the Italian houses. The Gommino costs around $695, boots and other loafers a little above, and leather goods into the low thousands. For a shoe made in a family factory in the Marche from a single hide, that is a fair number, and it is the piece we would buy first from this house.