Lace in Fashion

Gormally, Mary Frances

Abstract

This article is an extended response to the exhibition “Lace in Fashion” at Bath Fashion Museum (4th February 2017-1st January 2018). It argues that the exhibition is the “jewel in the crown” of all 2017 fashion exhibitions on view on this side of the Atlantic. What makes the Bath exhibition stand out as a good fashion exhibition lies in its multi-narrative approach to lace and lace making in historic and contemporary fashion. It is in the strategic curatorial selection of objects, the trajectory of visually striking vitrine displays, the detailed and informative captions that prompt rather than limit thinking, inviting international and national visitors into a wide range of meanings, interpretations and those unpredictable spaces of the imagined past and lived present where personal memories resonate and roam freely, creating for visitors a rich emotional and intellectual experience in a traditionally framed, object based, visitor centred, exhibition.

• Journal Article Type: Review
• Acceptance Date: Oct 26, 2017
• Online Publication Date: Oct 26, 2017
• Publication Date: May 4, 2019
• Journal: Fashion Theory - Journal of Dress Body and Culture
• Print ISSN: 1362-704X
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis (Routledge)
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 23
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 459-477
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17498430.2017.1392151
• Keywords: British and European fashion, textiles, hand, machine, chemical, needle made lace, Nineteenth Century machines, trade laws, royalty, catwalk, everyday fashion, curatorship, exhibiting practices
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/902047
• Publisher URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17498430.2017.1392151
• Additional Information: Additional Information : This is an Accepted Manuscript of an article published by Taylor & Francis in Fashion Theory on 26th October 2017, available online: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/17498430.2017.1392151.