Fashion and Fancy Dress:
The Messel Family Dress Collection 1865-2005

22 October 2005 to 16 July 2006

Please note this exhibition was due to close on 5 March but has been extended to 16 July 2006.

This exhibition chronicles and interprets the clothes worn by six generations of women from one remarkable family.

Drawn from a unique collection of garments, never before exhibited, it explores how treasured items of clothing, collected and preserved over time, represent family memory and heritage. A singular artistic and creative eye runs through the six generations encompassing English, Irish, French and Chinese style, and a love of fancy dress. From the 1870s onwards the women of this extended family - Mary Anne, Marion, Maud, Anne, Susan, Alison and today Anna - have fulfilled their social obligations to dress correctly, while demonstrating a strong individual style and a gentle aesthetic eccentricity.

Charles James dress c1936 & S.A Brooking dress c1874

Fashion and Fancy Dress: The Messel Family Dress Collection 1865–2005 is curated by Brighton & Hove Museums and is funded by the Esmée Fairbairn Foundation Regional Museums Initiative. It is accompanied by a fully illustrated publication.

Background and Context
The Messel Family Personalities
The Exhibition

Events

The Curators
Press

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