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Clothing & Textiles Collection
Image: Jacket - Blue Vinyl Mini
Source: Museum Victoria
This collection consists of clothing and textiles produced and used in historical and contemporary contexts in Victoria. It encompasses social history, design, manufacturing and craftsmanship.
Providing insight into the design, materials, manufacturing techniques and processes, and use and context of clothing and textiles in Victoria, it documents people's responses to their natural and built environments.
Clothing is broadly defined as anything that covers, adorns and accessorises the body. Textiles are broadly defined as vegetable, animal or synthetic materials enhanced by hand or machine to form threads, ropes and sheets of material that can be used to create other products.
Clothing and textiles are a significant form of material culture, and have also been acquired and interpreted in the context of other collection areas, such as Migration History, Childhood and Public Life.
Significant items:
- A comprehensive range of objects from several key Victorian manufacturers, some of which no longer exist, including the Simpson's Glove Factory and the Grenoble's glove collection.
- The Prue Acton Collection is of national significance as a record of the career of one of Australia's leading fashion designers from the 1960s to the 1980s.
- The Economic Botany Collection holds valuable 19th- and early 20th-century samples of both raw and manufactured textile materials.
- The Indigenous Cultures Collection includes a large range of clothing and textiles, including highly significant and unique 19th-century material.
Items per page: 10 50 (showing 41 - 50) 176 items
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Notebook - Patterns for Knitting Machine, Flat-bed, 'Preciosa', Wertheim, 1910
Notebook of patterns for use with the hand-powered flat-bed 'Preciosa' knitting machine manufactured by Wertheim (Germany) and retailed in Melbourne by Hugo Wertheim.
Images: 1 -
Knitting Pattern - Written on Scrap of Paper, for Knitting Machine, Flat-bed, 'Preciosa', ...
Fragment of paper - probably a cigarette packet - containing knitting patterns for use with the Wertheim 'Preciosa' Flat-bed knitting machine. Possible written in the 1910s.
Images: 2 -
Table Runner - Henrietta Gibson, Drawn Thread, circa 1900
Alternative Name(s): Table Cloth, Drawn Thread Work White drawn thread table runner made by Henrietta Gibson (nee Walpole), mother of Ada Henrietta. It is likely to have been made arou ...
Images: 2 -
Notebook & Loose Notes - Patterns for 'Socks' & Other Clothes, Knitting Machine, Flat-bed, ...
Notebook and loose notes of patterns for use with the hand-powered flat-bed 'Preciosa' knitting machine manufactured by Wertheim (Germany) and retailed in Melbourne by Hugo Wertheim.
Images: 14 -
Rule Book - Australian Boot Trade Employees' Federation, 1937
Booklet titled 'The Australian Boot Trade Employees' Federation, Rules, By-laws and Standing Orders' printed by Fraser & Jenkinson, Melbourne in 1937. The booklet was used by someone na ...
Images: 3 -
Knitting Books - The Lux Book & Lux Book Supplement, 1941
Two World War II era knitting books issued by Lever Bros. Pty Ltd under the Lux brand name, 1941. 'The Lux Book' contains a range of patterns for men, women and children; the 'Lux Book ...
Images: 6 -
Document - List of Gifts for Soldiers, 1918
Lined sheet of note paper listing the items made for, or sent as gifts to, soldiers during World War I by a Mrs J. Davis. She lists grey and brown slippers, face washers, linen and 'old ...
Images: 1 -
Letter - Thanks From 'A Wounded Infantryman' to Mrs James Davis, 7 Dec 1916
Letter on lined note paper from a wounded infantryman during World War I, addressed to a Mrs James Davis. According to the letter the soldier was wounded by a German machine gun, resul ...
Images: 1 -
Letter - Thanks from Driver E.D. Ross to Mrs J. Davis, 1917
Hand-written letter on stationery from the Australian Branch of the British Red Cross Society, written by Driver E. D. Ross to Mrs J. Davis during World War I. The letter was written b ...
Images: 1 -
Letter - Thanks from Private Donald Patience to Mrs Davis, 8 May 1915
Hand-written letter on stationary from the Presbyterian Soldiers' Institute, written by Private Donald Patience to Mrs Davis during World War I. The letter was written by Private (late ...
Images: 1



