Museums, dress and time

Abstract

This article presents work on dress-related time perspectives in a number of museums. First, a couple of Scandinavian museums are scrutinized. Catalogues, research and exhibitions show how the issue of dress is handled along two parallel lines. The understanding of folk connects dress to place, and the understanding of fashion connects dress to temporality. Over the last few years, dress research has challenged this paradigm. The exhibition Power of Fashion at Nordiska Museet exemplifies how new ideas are transferred from research to exhibition. The second part of this article presents some alternative discussions of museums, dress and time, supported by the concept of multiple temporalities. Based on this discussion, the article looks at exhibitions of historic dress in some European and American museums. Finally, the article suggests how inspiration from fashion exhibitions and the concepts of multiple temporalities can be useful when exhibiting historic dress.