Jan's Textile Learning Blog: Study Day at Plat Hall Costume Museum

On 14th July 2015 I attended the Study Day at the Gallery of Costume Platt Hall, Manchester. Platt Hall is an 18th century textile merchants hall and houses a large collection of clothing and accessories.

I was rather anxious about the study day as this was the first one I had attended since starting studying with the OCA. The study day was lead by OCA tutor Julie James-Turner who was most welcoming on my arrival at Platt Hall. She explained that there would only be two other students attending the day. The Hall was closed to the public that day therefore we had the run of the museum to ourselves.

The morning was given over to exploring the museum and its exhibits. The exhibition on at the moment is Something Blue: Wedding fashions 1914-2014. This was a large selection of wedding dresses through the decades. Some were donated for the exhibition by the brides themselves along with a photograph of themselves and the bridegroom on their wedding day. Alongside each dress was an explanation of where, when and why they had bought or had made their dress and the fabric used. I found the exhibition fascinating because you can see the change in styles and the materials used through the different years. It was interesting to see one from the 1920's that was gold coloured, in later years dresses were white or ivory coloured and then there was one that was black. This dress was bought by the bride the day before the wedding from a charity shop and according to the description was just what she was looking for.

The gold dress was from 1925 and has a scalloped hem embroidered with bugle beads and rhinestone trim. There are floating net panels on the sides. The dress was worn by Rose Pilkington for her weddng to Raymond Taylor who was a Lieutenant in the Royal Navy. The wedding was a society affair and the bride was given way by her godfather the Admiral of the Fleet, the 1st Earl Jellicoe. The veil had been retained by the family and has been worn by many members of the family for their weddings. The dress was donated by the bride's grandaughter.

The collection had a wide range of costumes and accessories from the 17th century to the present day including handbags and shoes. I liked the shoes in particular a pair from 1910-13 made from brown leather with tiny gold beads sewn on. They would not look out of place being worn today. The leather looked very soft and the pattern had been cut away to make a very attractive edging to the shoes.

Looking around the collection I was attracted to the finishing touches to the dresses such as the detail on the sleeves of the 17th century dress below. I like the pleated pieces with the lace edging because the manipulated fabric is made to look softer by the lacy edging and mirrors the delicate embroidery on the dress.

After lunch we were able to study, discuss and handle some of the examples from the collection. These included gloves, handbags, shawls, dresses from the 1920' and 1930's and corsets.

The day was very relaxed and enjoyable. I need not have had any fear of attending the study day and shall certainly have no qualms about attending more in the future. I really liked studying the items up close and being able to handle them. I also got a lot out of meeting the other students. This was good because they were at a different stage to myself in their studies with the OCA and it was interesting to hear how they approached their work. It was nice to be able to talk to them about the museum collection, their experience in textiles and the work they are doing at the moment. I feel this interaction with others is important as it can feel quite isolated doing a distance learning course and I think if possible attending study days is very helpful.