Month: December 2013

Breaking into Museums (for research, silly)

On By kittycalashIn Art Rant, Museums
Curator’s storeroom, World Rugby Museum

So, how do you get into museums?

Most of us come into through the front door, pay a fee or show a membership card, and enjoy whatever spectacle we’re after. Some of us like jelly fish, some of us like taxidermy, some of us like clothes.

A universal constant for going behind the scenes is a specific, and not a general, request. You can say, “Show me all your spoons,” but not even please is going to help when there are thousands of spoons.

I like researchers: they’re always interesting, they see the collections in ways I don’t, and they have insights that are valuable and useful. But someone who wants to see all the spoons, or all the chairs, or shoes, or fire buckets is really hard to help: There are too many of each of those things. Specific shoes, chairs, fire buckets or coats are manageable and realistic. “May I make an appointment to see spoon 1492.1.12, please?” is a question a curator, registrar, or collections manager can work with. One spoon, two spoons, five spoons, a few pairs of shoes: Studying these few things can take a great deal longer than you might expect.

STEAM Museum of the Great Western Railway storeroom

Think about it this way: in a Special Collections Library, you generally don’t begin with, “I’d like to see all your material on the Civil War.” For one thing, that will be a lot of stuff. Chances are good you won’t be interested in all (or even much) of it. What you’re really after is usually more specific. “All your home front diaries written by women over the age of 44,” or perhaps it’s “Battle accounts written by chaplains in the field.” Those requests archivists and librarians can and will gladly handle, and through a reference interview, can help you identify not just specific items on your topic, but help you think about your topic. But asking to see all the diaries (or anythings!) at once, is usually a non-starter. They’re all in separate collections, in separate boxes, on separate floors. Heck, I work in a place with hundreds of diaries, and I am pretty sure they’d call my therapist and the cops if I asked to see all the diaries at once. (Tempting thought that it is.)

Once in my life have I seen “all the somethings” pulled out from storage in a museum.  The Curator of  Photographs and Prints and a visiting (contracted) scholar were selecting daguerreotypes for an exhibition, and in my very junior role as the Curatorial Assistant, I got to pull out all the daguerreotypes by Thomas M. Easterly and help spread them out on an enormous mahogany table. I’ll never forget how beautiful that was, and how special, to see so same silvered plates and brass mats spread out on a dark surface. If this link is stable, you can get a sense of what it was like. Once, in a quarter century of working in museums. Sad, isn’t it? more people should get this chance, but it’s rare. However, this rule is in place for the preservation and security of the objects.

Yes, I want this wall of chairs. The Röhsska Museum, GÖTEBORG, Sweden

These kinds of restrictions are part of why museums have open storage, and it’s why I wish we could have open storage. But most museums don’t, so the key to getting into the storerooms (or the research rooms) is to ask the right way. I did a presentation on the process, and there’s more good advice over at the Still Room Blog.

Always, in museums or in libraries, if there’s a catalog, start there! You can narrow down your choices with database searches and questions in advance so that you can make the absolute most of the time you have. Your time is precious. Focusing in on what you really want to see will help the museum’s staff help you better. And if you really enjoy a collection, please consider supporting it financially, with a donation to a collections care fund, annual fund, or a membership. Your dollars count, they’re noticed, and they’re truly appreciated.

Les Oublies

On By kittycalashIn Museums
Les Oublies. Le Bon Genre Plate 79: three ladies and a child look at a sundial in a garden, watched by a man. August 1815 Hand-coloured etching. British Museum 2003,U.14

I was first attracted to this image by the gentleman and his shapely legs, as you might expect, since tight buttoned gaiters or overalls do turn my head. This plate doesn’t make much sense to me: I can’t really grasp the satire, I can only guess. The explanation given for the series doesn’t help immensely. “The series is devoted to costume, mostly set in fashionable interiors, but the plates are treated in a semi-caricatural, humorous way that links them with French social satire.”

My best guess is that this plate from 1815 is showing off the latest filmy white fashions and tiny pink Spencers in contrast to the forgotten origins of the classical influence, personified by the gentleman in common dress at left. His hat and the gaiters suggest the French revolution, now forgotten (see “oublier” though the reference is also to the small cakes being eaten by the woman under the tree). The clock provides a reference to the passing of time, and forgetting, but I don’t think it is actually a sundial. The strap makes it look as if the man can carry it, and that’s a needle, not the fixed vane of a sundial.

Whatever it all means, I do find this more interesting for the man’s clothing than the women’s; after a while, the subtle differences between white columns is lost on me, but that’s a pretty interesting buff-colored waistcoat.

The Historical Sew Fortnightly: 2013 review, 2014 plans

On By kittycalashIn Clothing, Historical Sew Fortnightly, Living History, making things, Thanks2 Comments
The Andes Candies coat at Saratoga

I didn’t get nearly as many things made for the 2013 Historical Sew Fortnightly as I wanted to. Some of the challenges didn’t appeal to me,  but mostly I just couldn’t keep up! Reenacting ate a lot of my life, especially in the late summer and fall. The Andes Candies coat and the What Cheer Day sewing, while totally gratifying, happened when I was thinking about the “Green” color challenge. But, on the positive side, because I’ve waited and played with Spencers, I have a much better pattern plus what I hope will be an entry for HSF #25, the One-Metre Challenge.

Looking ahead to 2014, I can see that July and August are going to be tough. We expect to have a lot going on at work, and the reenacting season will be in full, heavy swing. (Starting July 19th, there are five weeks in a row of events and work. We won’t be able to do everything, so there will be some figuring out to do. Also, our house will be a mess.)

The 2014 Challenges Announced Thus Far:

Last year’s mending. This year: more lost buttons.

Challenge #1, Make Do and Mend, will be a chance to fix things I know are awry. There’s a petticoat hem come undone, some binding that needs reattaching, buttons popped off waistcoats, and haversack straps to be shortened. That’s all without even looking: Imagine what I’ll find if I look (or maybe not, it could get ugly). I think this challenge will help me tidy up after last season, and prepare for the next. There was mending last year, too.

Challenge #2, Innovation, is a little more worrying. I’ve got a major dress project underway, and will have to adapt that to this challenge. Fortunately, I think compere fronts on sacques might count as an innovation, so that will help keep me on track.

Mrs. Elijah Boardman and her Son, William Whiting Boardman. The Huntington Library, 83.8.15
Mrs. Elijah Boardman and her Son, William Whiting Boardman. The Huntington Library, 83.8.15

Challenge #3, Pink! Will probably not be mine. None of the things I plan to make are even remotely pink. I thought I had some pink silk and was about to ditch the sacque for a pink Ralph Earl, but it turns out that silk is more lavender than pink. I looked at some pink silk, but then Sew 18th Century helped convince me to buy the cross-barred silk instead. And, like yellow, pink can be unfortunate on me, unless it is coral. Of course, pink can mean red if you’re making traditional hunting clothes…so this could still get interesting. And I know of a receipt for 5/8 of a yard of pink satin…which sounds to me like a waistcoat.

Challenge #4, Under it All, will probably have to be pocket hoops or other skirt supports for the sacque. I have been working on a faux quilted petticoat, with limited success (it may qualify for make do and mend…), but would need hip pads to round out the silhouette properly. Have you noticed this is a bit out of order? Yes, I need the skirt supports first, but six weeks in advance is plenty of time! Well, from this vantage point, anyway. It’ll look like madness on the other side of New Year’s.

I know I’ll miss deadlines and fall behind, I know I’ll get distracted in the summer and stop reading about all the great things people have made, but thanks to the HSF, I’ve kept more on track and become a better seamstress, than I was a year ago. Many thanks and kudos to the Dreamstress and everyone else around the world who joined in, and will join in, on this international sew-along.

Muff-ed Up

On By kittycalashIn Clothing, making things, Museums2 Comments

Remember the Amazon? She has the dressed-up dog and the Muff of Doom. I’ve gotten a little obsessed with her, and that obsession has led to some interesting places.

The Muff of Dooms Past. Poor minks.

For one thing, it’s winter, and everybody has cold hands, so everybody is making muffs.

Here at Crazy Scheme Central, I had thought about making the great Ikea sheepskin Muff of Doom, but that’s a place I generally don’t go until after the Christmas madness, when the store in Stoughton does look as if it had been plundered by orcs.

Instead, I bought a Muff of Dooms Past at an antique store. I wouldn’t buy a new real fur anything, and I do feel bad about the poor minks, but at least no new minks were harmed. Or sheep. But golly, it’s soft and delicious and it’s easy to see why people wanted fur, given that we’re essentially hairless mammals. It measures 11 inches high (not including decoration) by 11 inches wide at the narrowest point, and 14 inches wide at the base.

Pupils of nature Maria Caroline Temple delt. ; TS. sculp. London] : Pubd. April 30, 1798, by S.W. Fores, No. 50 Piccadilly, corner of Sachville [sic] St., [1798]. Lewis Walpole Library Call Number 798.04.30.01+
Pupils of nature Maria Caroline Temple delt. ; TS. sculp. London] : Pubd. April 30, 1798, by S.W. Fores, No. 50 Piccadilly, corner of Sachville [sic] St., [1798]. Lewis Walpole Library Call Number 798.04.30.01+

The Muff of Dooms Past is not nearly as large as the Amazon’s muff, or as large as the ones seen in fashion plates and satires.  The sad little tail-and-paw fringe has precedent (see left), though I believe at least one tail has been lost. As far as I can tell, with no label, this is probably a 1950s muff of local manufacture (there is a fur company, now in Warwick, that started in Providence, and is now going out of business). It could be earlier, but the flexibility of the pelts suggests a more recent vintage.

The Met has some fantastic late 18th/early 19th century muffs of a color that screams warmth. The size of the brighter one is just 8 by 7 inches. In case you think that’s anomalous, here’s another muff of similar type and size.

They seem small compared to the Amazon’s muff, and even the Student of Nature’s. And yet, there they are. It’s hard to know exactly where the measurements were taken, and if they include the extreme fluff of the feathers; I tend to think not, but that the measurements are for the firmest part of the muff. (That’s how we would measure, and then include the largest “fluff” measurements in a ‘special measurements’ field with a note.) There is a 1780-1820 swan’s down muff at the V&A with a record but no photo or measurements.

Satires are hard to use: we know they’re depicting some grain of truth, usually in the background details, but also in what they’re portraying. How do we interpret those enormous muffs? They appear over and over, in consecutive years of satirical engravings and fashion plates. Maybe the way to interpret them is to see those muffs as the extreme end of fashion– Alexander McQueen muffs, if you will– and the extant muffs represent the more reasonable dimensions of fashion. I wouldn’t call red feather muffs typical, and I wouldn’t suggest we all carry them. But based on what exists in museum collections, maybe a smaller-than-satire muff is within the bounds of reason for actual use.