The 500+ items from the Museum’s extensive collections, which are presented in the Fashion and Fabric exhibition, provide a special insight into aspects of fashion and textile design history, with a special emphasis on developments in Denmark over the last 400 years. A careful selection of textiles, fashion garments and accessories will present the design, textile techniques, manufacturing processes, tastes and fashion ideals of many different eras.

The purpose of the exhibition is to introduce the history of Danish fashion and textiles to a wide audience, ranging from professionals in the fashion industry to all the Museum’s visitors. Fashion and textiles have always been extremely popular with the Museum’s guests. Danish design and fashion are also more relevant than ever. According to the trade association, Wear and the Danish Chamber of Commerce, Danish fashion export amounts to 4.3% of Denmark’s total exports, and continued growth is forecast. In the textile sector, Danish companies such as Kvadrat are also receiving extensive international recognition. The fashion and textile exhibition will now finally enable visitors to learn more about, and explore the success at the root of the 20th-century design tradition in Denmark.

The exhibition has three themes: Design and Decoration; Craftsmanship and Industry; and Body and Identity. Meanwhile, a special space will house new, and current focus exhibitions, which will change on a regular basis. Initially, this space will be devoted to children’s clothing from the past 150 years, when in January 2015 the Museum opens the special exhibition, Century of the Child.

The textile collection, which dates back further than the museum’s fashion collection, represents peak achievements in most areas of textile art from the Renaissance until today. The largest collections deal with Danish embroidery, weaving and textile printing from the 20th century. In addition, the collection contains textiles in most techniques, especially from Europe and Asia, from various time periods. This includes tapestries, French and Italian silk fabrics, folk weaving, embroidery from around the world, bobbin lace, batik and ikat weaving. Two of the finest specimens in the collection are the museum’s unique collection of Danish hedebo embroidery from the 18th-20th century and two tapestries from the mid-20th century based on cartoons by the French painter Henri Matisse.

The main emphasis of the fashion collection is on Danish women’s fashion from the 20th century. The most prominent parts of the collection are fine Danish tailor-made fashion from the 1930s-1960s, Erik Mortensen’s collection of haute couture dresses from the Paris fashion houses of Balmain and Jean-Louis Scherrer, Danish ready-made fashion from the 1960s, one-off clothes by 20th-century designers and works by selected active Danish fashion designers, including designs by Jan Machenhauer, Elise Gug, Ivan Grundahl, Nørgaard paa Strøget, Anne Damgaard, Laura Baruël, Nikoline Liv Andersen, Henrik Vibskov and Peter Jensen. The collection also includes a small but very fine collection of historical fashion from the 1700s and 1800s. Most of the historical clothing was originally collected for its textile values, but today it can also be seen as representations of the varying fashion styles and concepts of beauty over the ages.

In the museum’s collection efforts for the period of 2012-2017, the goal is to strengthen the existing areas of the fashion and textile collection with particular emphasis on 20th-century Danish fashion design, sustainable and socially responsible fashion and textile design and examples of the use of smart textiles in designs of a high artistic quality

As for the museum’s exhibition activity in the field of fashion and textile design, there have over the years been several historical textile and clothing exhibitions based on the museum’s collections. Prominent examples include the exhibitions Alverdens Broderier (Embroidery from around the world; 1983) and Pragt & Poesi. Kniplinger gennem 400 år (Splendour and poetry. Four centuries of bobbin lace; 1991) and Rococo-mania (2012). Fashion exhibitions at Designmuseum Danmark have often featured borrowed objects. The popular touring exhibition Théâtre de la Mode, which was shown at the museum in 1946, had been put together by Paris fashion houses. Later, in 1988, the museum cooperated with L’Union des Arts Décoratifs in Paris to stage the special exhibition Stjerner i fransk mode (Stars in French Fashion) based on borrowed objects, including some from the Paris museum Musée de la Mode et du Textile. In 2007 the museum presented the exhibition Marimekko – the story of a Nordic brand, which was based on the collections of textile and fashion at the Design Museum in Helsinki. In 2010 the museum curated the special exhibition Walk on the Wild Side. Margit Brandt Design 1965-1980, which was mainly based on objects from Margit and Erik Brandt’s private archives.

About Designmuseum Danmark’s fashion and textile collection
Designmuseum Danmark has one of the country’s most extensive collections of fashion and textiles with thousands of items, ranging from historical garments dating back to the 18th century to contemporary couture (tailoring) from the likes of designers such as Denmark’s Anne Sofie Madsen.

Opening hours and closed days
Tuesday – Sunday, 11 am – 5 pm, Wednesdays 11 am- 9 pm, Monday closed
Closed: 1 January, Easter Monday, Whit Monday, 24, 25, 26 and 31 December

Designmuseum Danmark
Bredgade 68
DK-1260 København K
+45 (0)33-185656
info @ designmuseum.dk
http://designmuseum.dk