By Annabel Dobbyn Photograph by Sarah Goolishian When I tell strangers that I work in a textile conservation studio, I know exactly what will happen. A blank look eclipses their face. The whites of their eyes blow open and then they narrow. They unhinge their jaws and ask: what? It is a bit thrilling, possessing […]
Senator Kelly’s Spacesuit
By Annabel Dobbyn The year is 2016. Beyonce’s Lemonade comes out, the beloved David Bowie passes on, and American politicians are at each other’s throats. Now open twitter, not X, and see that one of the top trending videos is a gorilla. No, not Harambe, the gorilla shot and killed at the Cincinnati zoo. This […]
Conserving Mother Seton’s dancing slippers – America’s first saint
Elizabeth Ann Bayley Seton (1774-1821) was a Catholic sister and founder of Saint Joseph’s Academy and Free School, the first Catholic girls’ school in America, Emmitsburg, MD, 1810. She dedicated her life to the care of children, the poor, and her school. In 1975 she was the first American canonized as a saint. Mother Seton […]
The textiles that bind us – in memory of Mike Heffner, 1967-2023
How many of you have a beloved sweater, jeans, or your mother’s shirt or father’s scarf? Textiles can be transformative, alive, sharing their stories by context, memory, and touch. A baseball cap might be just a baseball cap until your hero signs it. You now hold what the other person once held. A central principle […]
Sparkling Smart Smithies Share Textiles Studio Time
We always look forward to the annual fall studio visit of the Smith College Museum Studies students, and this year was a dynamic group!
Preserving The Clothing of Diplomacy
Celebrating French/American Relations Through These and Other Objects in the U.S. Ambassador’s residence in the Hôtel Rothschild Collaborative blog by Elizabeth Wise, Kaitlyn Munro, Katherine Hill McIntyre, Julia BrennanAll images are courtesy of Caring for Textiles unless otherwise noted. The Lights that Guide Us: A Celebration of Hôtel Rothschild et son Jardin Pontalba & the […]
Through the Onlooking Glass: A View to Open Conservation
The goal of open conservation labs is to “connect with art, science, world cultures, and history in ways that engage and delight,”
Restoring The “Star-Spangled Banner” of Frederick Maryland: Part Two
By Kaitlyn Munro If you missed the first part of this two-part series, click here to read that post. Our introduction to Mrs. Shawbaker’s flag began with an initial assessment in 2020. It was mounted and framed in the 1980’s. The flag was puckered, distorted and wrinkled, with hundreds of disfiguring and damaging stitches done […]
The “Star-Spangled Banner” of Frederick Maryland: Part One
By Kaitlyn Munro Oh say, can you see” this remarkable flag? I think sometimes people tend to think of flags as ordinary textiles in the sense that we see them everywhere; outside office buildings, schools, homes etc. Though they remain symbolically powerful, we think of them as universally alike. When a flag tells an interesting […]
Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum Launches New, Moving Exhibition Of Victims’ Clothes
On Monday, December 27, 2021, in Phnom Penh, Cambodia, Tuol Sleng Genocide Museum launched a new, moving exhibition of victims’ clothes—Remembering S-21 Victims through their Clothes: Textiles Preservation at Tuol Sleng Museum. The exhibition is the culmination of four years of focused conservation triage, treatment, and training in order to preserve the clothing and textile […]
