Fur On The Brain

Fur collar from the Henry Art Gallery Collection
collections.henryart.org

Ok guys, I can't spend much time blogging this weekend because I've got this big lecture coming up about fur and fashion in Seattle and...well let's just say it still needs a lot of work. So here are some links to entertain you.

If you are like "Clara talking about fur and fashion?!?! Tell me more!" Go here:

Guest post I wrote for the Henry Art Gallery Blog

Info about my program and how to sign up

"Thanks Clara, but I'll pass. What else is going on in the world of costume and fashion this week?"

Gland you asked! The Miss Universe pageant is happening soon, which means that it is time for the FANTASTICALLY RIDICULOUS PARADE OF NATIONAL COSTUMES. I direct you to this wonderful four-part commentary:

Part I: Bird Women and Show Girls!
Part II: Virgins & Brides!
Part III: Warriors, Goddesses & Queens!
Part IV: Crazies, Lazies, & Try-Hards!

Enjoy!

Goodbye To Weird Limbs

It is done. This week I finished switching all the outfits on the mannequins at the museum, which included removing the weird paper heads and limbs. Besides what I felt was a serious creep factor, the extra parts made these twice-yearly dressings a lot more difficult. I understand why we decided to use them initially, and I gave them a good two-year try. But the heads and limbs were very hard to work with and added an element of uncertainty that ate up a lot of time. 

For example, last time I switched out the 1950s mannequin I had to contend with this:

This is actually one of my favorite little suits in the collection: It is beautifully cut, has an elegant drape of fabric on the back, and was sold by John Doyle Bishop. But on display it looked dour and awkward. After dressing it the first day I had to buy some additional accessories to try to cheer it up, but it still basically looked like this in the case.

This time, we had pre-padded the 1950s mannequin and so at the museum it took only a few minutes to dress and we knew exactly what it was going to look like. I forgot to take a picture of it in the case, but this is the basic idea:

So simple, so elegant! You notice the dress first and not the face! 

I also was able to add artifact shoes to the cases for the first time ever. The old mannequin limbs had feet that were large and stiff. I only used prop shoes because getting something on those feet involved a lot of frustrated stretching and shoving. But now, since we weren't trying to create the illusion of a body, I could just set a pair of artifact shoes on the case floor next to the dress. These are the totally cute shoes I picked:

So now the limbs are all resting peacefully in a strange jumble on a supply shelf. 

The only part that gives me a little pang of sadness is the paper hair for the 1850s woman (at the center of the picture). I think the volunteer and I who worked on it did an awesome job. The 1920s hair turned out pretty nice as well. Creating the paper hair for the mannequins was a particularly fun part of the prep for the new museum, and it is a skill I wouldn't mind developing further. 

There is actually one head n' limbs mannequin still on display. Just around the corner from the 1850s pioneer woman we have the 1860s "Mercer Girl" who is not in a case and is wearing a reproduction dress that we commissioned for the exhibit. Since it is a reproduction, the dress doesn't get changed like the others. It makes sense for her to be more lifelike because the mannequin isn't showing off an artifact, it is representing the idea of a person starting her new life in Seattle. I'm the most proud of the 1850s hair, but I really like the little 1860s snood we gave this one. 

Sorry the photo is so washed out. My camera also really hates those mannequin parts. 

New Year, New Database

Last week, instead of finishing up a bunch of end-of-year projects on my to-do list, I got sick!

Slow Pie To The Face = 

That "I think I'm coming down with something" feeling

On New Year's Eve I went to bed at 8pm, and rang in 2015 the next day by binge-watching Friends.

So this week I ran headfirst into 2015 with a messy desk and a mannequin-dressing area still coated in scraps of polyester batting and wayward bras. But there was no time to tidy up mannequin undies, because the big news this week was our NEW DATABASE. 

Databases are a cause of anxiety for most museum collections staff. You basically HAVE to have some sort of digital way to track your collection unless 1) You have only 10 items and you can see them all from your desk or 2) You are a time traveller from the 1950s and find it perfectly acceptable to use a paper card catalog where "running a search" means looking through every single card. BUT databases don't come cheap, and you can drive yourself crazy trying to pick which one is perfect for your needs. 

Getting this database has been a multi-year process of begging, advocating, researching, discussing, polite arguing, and more begging. At once point, one of the higher ups was like "Why do you you need a new one? The old one seems to be working just fine." JUST FINE??? JUST FINE!?!?!?!? Clearly you don't see us working at our desks every day like...

I'd like to protect the identity of our old database so let me just call it "Chad." Chad was old. Chad was outdated. Chad had lots of features that didn't make any sense. Chad didn't have a global search, so so if you were looking for a specific name or business, you had to search separately in each field that might contain that word. Chad would crash at random times or all the colors on the screen would get weird and it meant he was corrupted and had to be reinstalled. Even the company who made Chad wasn't supporting him any more. 

So we FINALLY have our new database up and running. It is called Proficio (actual name) and it is life changing. I'm still learning how to navigate all its features and I sometimes get frustrated, but it is usually just because Proficio is different and change is hard. When I stop to think about it, I realize the old way was actually a nonsensical Chad work-around, and this new way is better. 

While the data was being transferred from the old to the new, there were a few weeks there where we couldn't use Chad OR Proficio. So in addition to feeling like I didn't finish all my year-end organizational projects, I also have a whole backlog of database work to catch up on. So it is just a few days into the New Year and I already feel way behind. 

Oh well. It is 2015, baby! At least I can pretend to be fabulous and in control.

2014 In Review

There are many things I could write about 2014, but there are few that could be more simply put or more satisfying than this:

These are all the wire hangers that were removed from collections storage in 2014. This pile represents hundreds of garments which are now on better hangers or stored in boxes because of work done this year by me and my incredible team of volunteers.

So here's to all the accomplishments of 2014, and may 2015 be filled with many new and fulfilling endeavors.

Cheers!

Holiday Celebrations

I went a whole week without mentioning Miss Fisher on this blog, but that drought is about to end.

While watching the entire series for a second time, Olivia and I were reminded that Phryne's birthday is December 21st--"Summer Solstice" since the show takes place in Australia. And since Melbourne is 18 hours ahead of Seattle, Saturday was the perfect day to celebrate.  We drank champagne, ate multiple kinds of cheese, and settled in for four episodes of Miss Fisher and the movie Cold Comfort Farm.

Good times.

Sunday we celebrated Hanukkah by making/eating piles of latkes at Olivia's parents' house, and then singing a bunch of old timey Christmas carols at at party at my parents' house. (Like, Renaissance/Medieval old timey).

WHO REQUESTED JINGLE BELLS?!?!

Speaking of Christmas, I found this strange ad for a menswear store in the Seattle Times from 1920:

Employing the time-honored marketing tool of obnoxious screaming men...

...and the puzzled women who love them.

Nothing like a desperate plea for underwear to put you in the Christmas spirit

So however you celebrate this season of holidays, may joy and blessings be with you.

Helloooo Sailor!

It's that time of year!

Advent? Hanukkah? Solstice? Well yes, but also MANNEQUIN DRESSING TIME.

Ever since the new MOHAI opened two years ago I've been rotating the garments at the museum every six months. Prep work happens in December and June, and the switches usually happen in January and July.

As usual, I've got a few pieces that I'm really excited about. This round is particularly thrilling because I've finally gotten approval to switch out the weird face mannequins for plainer forms.

WHAT?!?!

I had a long list of reasons why I wasn't a big fan of these forms, but the main issue was that they limited what kinds of dresses I could use. There are a couple really fab gowns that didn't fit the old forms that are now back in the pipeline for display.

Whatever. I'll still haunt your dreams, suckers.

Also as usual, there are a few outfits that I'm nervous about. Will they be easy to dress? Are there hidden condition issues that will only become obvious halfway through the process? One frequent source of consternation is the WWII uniform. With most of the other outfits I feel confident doing the dressing and writing labels. If I have questions about how something should be properly dressed, I know how to do that research and what sources to look at. I can also feel confident that my educated guess is probably pretty good, and it is unlikely that someone will be OUTRAGED by a choice I make. But military uniforms are a whole different deal. I don't know that much about them, but there are a lot of people who do. If I put the wrong pieces together, tie something the wrong way, or attach a medal in the wrong place, people will notice that mistake IMMEDIATELY. And they will make sure someone HEARS ABOUT IT.

Or perhaps just stop what they are doing and look at me with distain

For this round I picked a crisp Navy dress blue uniform, colloquially referred to as "crackerjacks (someone had to tell me that, I had no idea).

Well, Hellooooo Sailor!

(fun fact: Looking someone up and down and then saying "Hellooooo Sailor" 

has a 9/10 success rate of totally creeping them out)

Becoming a fashion historian is like gaining a sort of visual literacy. I sometimes have to remind myself that the general public doesn't automatically know the difference between clothing from 1880s and 1900, and that a slinky long dress with a natural waist is obviously more of a 1930s look than 1925.

Or that calling this a "Marie Antoinette Costume" is clearly some kind of mistake

But I don't have that visual literacy for uniforms, and it sort of freaks me out. Fortunately, I know a couple experts I can call on with questions about ties, tucked or untucked shirts, and what all the symbols and stripes mean. So I'm learning, but its not a language that I'm picking up easily. However, I am at the point where I can correctly identify that this:

...is NOT standard military issue. 

Unless there is some special ops stripper division that I don't know about.

Sigh. Still so much to learn. 

Blogger angst

Last weekend I started writing a post but then got all hesitant and ended up never actually publishing it. Basically, with the news so dominated by Michael Brown and Eric Garner, it has felt weird to post anything on social media that isn't about racism in America. But then it also felt weird to post my two cents, because I'm like 0% the authority on what it is like to be a person of color in this country. I sort of feel like...

Basically, replace "advice" with "discourse on resolving institutional racism" and "sarcastic comment" with "fashion-related factoid" or "comedic gif."

I think I'm better off listening and educating myself, but at the same time, I don't want people to imagine I don't think or care about anything beyond what I write about here. If I wail about how emotionally devastated I was by the end of Season 2 of Miss Fisher, you all know that that grief is not actually equal to the grief I feel about real human suffering, right?

(It is more important to me to live in a world where Black Lives Matter than get a Phryne/Jack kiss, but frankly neither seemed like MUCH TO ASK FOR)

So while I support many causes for justice and equality, I still have a lot to learn, and I certainly shouldn't have delusions that I'm some kind of leading voice. On this blog, I will continue to only get on my soap box for causes I can speak about authoritatively.

Here are some things I felt qualified to speak about authoritatively this week:

1) How amazing these shoes are:

c. 1912 purchased at Seattle store Turrell's

2) How exciting it is to get Christmas music passed out during choir practice:

WE'RE SINGING THE SUSSEX CAROL!?!?!?!

3) How embarrassingly bad my french pronunciation is:

A french person, probably

(We are also singing "Un flambeau, Jeannette Isabelle" or as I say it "Ann Flambow Janet Eesabellah")