FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE Nov. 7, 2018 Contact: costume@cornell.edu Location: Human Ecology Building, Level T Display Cases Hours: 8 AM – 8 PM on weekdays, 9 AM – 4 PM on weekends We are always free and open to the public! Exhibition, WOMEN EMPOWERED: Fashions from the Frontline, features items worn by prominent activists, politicians, artists, […]
19th Century Fashion History
Undergraduate Research Assistant Profile: Rachel Doran ’19
Name: Rachel Doran Class year: 2019 Major: Fiber Science and Apparel Design – Fashion Design Management When did you begin working in the collection and what inspired you to join the CCTC? I started working in the collection spring semester of my freshman year. I actually found out about the collection when I was visiting […]
Potentially Perilous Fashion
Blog post by Samantha Stern ’17. Fashions come in many forms, but few realize the potentially dangerous aspects of vintage and antique fashion. The term “mad hatter” is common vernacular, and comes from milliner’s occupational exposure to mercury (and, as a result, going “mad as a hatter”) in the late 19th century. Less well known […]
Mini Portraits: An Exploration of Childrenswear in the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries
Blog post by Jacklyn DeVito ’18. The Cornell Costume and Textile Collection holds an array of childrenswear dating back to the eighteenth century. Garments of each time period share common elements, which serve to represent the values and standards of each respective era. As societal expectations of children’s behavior evolved over the 19th and 20th […]
A Dress to Remember
Blog post by Susan W. Greene, MA ’94 In the 1930s, Cornell University’s College of Home Economics received an amazing offer. The head of the Department of Textiles and Clothing, Professor Beulah Blackmore, was contacted by a Cornell alumna, Ida Langdon (MA 1910, PhD 1912) wondering whether the College would be interested in the Victorian […]
Envisioning the Future Through the Past: The Ongoing History of the Cornell Costume & Textile Collection
A Summer in the Cornell Costume & Textile Collection

Blog post by Rachel Doran (’19) There’s no better way to enjoy a gorgeous Ithaca summer than to spend your days in a windowless room. You may think I’m kidding, but I chose to trade sunshine, gorges, and waterfalls for 19th century dresses. No regrets. This summer I received a College of Human Ecology Summer […]