THE Salisbury Museum is set to unveil its new fashion gallery next month with a very special guest.
The gallery, which is going to house a stylish collection of fashion items, is being officially opened on Saturday August 7 by British fashion icon Dame Zandra Rhodes, who has dressed well-known figures including Barbra Streisand, Freddie Mercury, and Princess Diana to name just a few.
To celebrate the opening of the new gallery there will be activities for all ages to enjoy throughout the day running from 10am to 4pm, and opportunities to learn the secrets of curating a fashion gallery.
Look Again project
The project to redisplay the fashion collection, called Look Again: Discovering Centuries of Fashion started in March 2018.
Young people attended an afterschool club at the museum, and groups including those from St Joseph’s Catholic School and the Arts University Bournemouth worked alongside the museum team and heritage volunteers from the Arts Society.
Katy England, the Look Again project coordinator said: “It has been an amazing experience for the museum team to work alongside the young people and heritage volunteers on this project.
"We are working really hard now on preparations for the opening of the gallery and looking forward to seeing the doors open to visitors.
"It is a privilege to have Zandra Rhodes open the gallery and we can’t wait to welcome her to the museum.”
The fashion collection
Just over 140 years ago, Jane ‘Jinny’ Hussey Townsend travelled from her Salisbury home to the bustling city of Paris to buy her wedding dress. She chose a stunningly vibrant yellow gown with a low bustle and matching shoes.
That dress is part of the collection in the new Fashion Gallery at the Museum.
The carefully curated collection includes a wide selection of fashion items ranging from a girl’s pretty red coat made from her father’s military tunic worn during the Boer War, to gentlemen’s silk waistcoats worn at court, and a skirt and bodice from Christian Dior’s 1950 Ligne Long collection.
It is the result of three years’ work by local young people working alongside the museum team, volunteers and experts, all sharing their skills and enthusiasm to produce this new show which explores our changing relationship with clothes.
Jinny Townsend’s cherished dress will be displayed only a few hundred yards from where she was brought up.
She lived much of her life at Mompesson House which is just along the road from the museum in Salisbury Cathedral Close.
She wed Willie Hammick on 17 June 1879 but sadly died just three years later aged 38 after giving birth to three children.
The provenance of many of the items have been carefully researched and give a fascinating insight into the lives of their owners.
Hidden under the floorboards
A silk high-heeled shoe on display was originally found beneath the floorboards of a cottage in Upper Woodford, Salisbury.
Dating from the 1730s the fashionable and expensive shoe had been carefully darned and repaired before it was deliberately placed under the floor.
Representing a folk tradition that spans at least 600 years, shoes were hidden in homes in the hope that their ability to mould to the wearer’s foot would permeate them with their spirit and ward off evil.
Project funding
The Look Again project has been made possible by a grant of £115,360 from the Museums Association Esmée Fairbairn Collections Fund.
The Arts Society Sarum also supported the new gallery with funding for the young people’s wider interior design ideas which included a new colour scheme and updated flooring.
Online talk Dame Zandra Rhodes
Dame Zandra Rhodes, is giving an online talk and will be in conversation with Jon Lys Turner, chair of Salisbury Museum.
The online event will be hosted live from Dame Zandra’s Rainbow Penthouse, situated above the Fashion and Textile Museum in Bermondsey, which she founded in 2003.
It takes place on August 18 at 7.30pm via Zoom. To book a place visit: eventbrite.co.uk/e/online-talk-dame-zandra-rhodes-in-conversation-with-jon-lys-turner-tickets-157252665957
For more information visit: salisburymuseum.org.uk
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