Last week’s blog was about how we take inspiration from nature for our InStitches’ dyed fabrics and threads, so I was particularly intrigued to visit the exhibition, Fashioned from Nature, which opened recently at the V&A, London. The exhibition aims to explore the relationship between fashion and nature from 1600 up to the present time. Not only does it show how fashion has been inspired by nature but it also highlights the effects on the natural environment of the fashion industry. I didn’t have a enough time to view the whole of the exhibition in one go so in this visit I focused on the more direct and troubling interaction with nature, which is featured on the ground floor.
Here are just a few of the exhibits which caught my attention.
Here are just a few of the exhibits which caught my attention.
Thank goodness for female emancipation, it has spare generations of women from many things, not least the constraints of a whale bone corset
and the dresses which required huge hooped underskirts. I just can’t begin to imagine how restricted and constrained life would have been wearing such garments.
The clothes we wore reflected our social status so having such a tiny waist (just look at the female jacket modelled above!) was a way of showing the society that you were wealthy enough to employ the servants to do the work you obviously couldn’t given the clothing you wore!
The production of the raw materials and the subsequent processing had huge social and environmental effects - think of the cotton plantations, polluted rivers and working conditions in the huge northern cotton and woollen mills.
Many animals and birds were slaughtered, some to the point of extinction, in the pursuit of fashion. Most of this part of the exhibition was both sobering and fascinating in equal measure.
Fans of Alice in Wonderland will recall the mad hatter. Mercuric nitrate was used in the felting process from the early 1700s and mercury poisoning was a common occupational hazard for hatters. To this day the V&A still keeps its many felt hats in sealed bags!
There are so many interesting and thought provoking exhibits that I think I’m going to have to visit several times to really get the most out of this exhibition. Fortunately it runs until the end of January 2019!
Until next week, enjoy the (finger’s crossed) warm weather forecast for this bank holiday weekend,
Hazel & Terry
There are so many interesting and thought provoking exhibits that I think I’m going to have to visit several times to really get the most out of this exhibition. Fortunately it runs until the end of January 2019!
Until next week, enjoy the (finger’s crossed) warm weather forecast for this bank holiday weekend,
Hazel & Terry
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