New Exhibition – N.4 RED

Our new exhibition ‘RED’, the fourth in our series ‘Our Collection by Colour’ will be open from 30 August to 13 October, Friday 4pm to 8pm and Saturday/Sunday 1pm to 5pm. FREE entry, donation very welcome. Rare Renaissance textiles, ecclesiastical garments, reconstructions and one of Jude Law’s costume as Henry …

Exhibition of our Collection by Colour No.3 Brown

Our new exhibition ‘BROWN’, the third in our series ‘Our Collection by Colour’ is open from 15 December 2023 to 28 January 2024. Friday 4pm to 8pm Saturday/Sunday 1pm to 5pm. FREE entry, donation welcome. No booking in advance required. Please download (and share) our flyer for more information by …

PATTERNS OF FASHION FESTIVAL

Patterns of Fashion Festival A celebration of Janet Arnold’s Patterns of Fashion books past, present and future London 1st–4th December 2023 This festival is being held in celebration of Janet Arnold’s book series Patterns of Fashion, of which The School of Historical Dress is now the publisher. Six books in …

Combined review of POF1, 2 and 6

“These books are a gift to costume designers and costume makers. Fashion designers, like the late, great Vivienne Westwood, might also find them inspiring. They have a natural home on the bookshelves of costume curators and dress historians. In terms of value for money, these books are astonishing – they …

LIVE Virtual Tours of our Exhibition

We are now offering places on live virtual tours via ZOOM of our BLUE exhibition. Book places on our webshop HERE. There are two GENERAL tours on the 16th and 17th September, one whole tour with a focus on the Japanese garments in the exhibition on the 23rd September and …

Our BLUE exhibition and festival

Our new exhibition ‘BLUE’, the second in our series ‘Our Collection by Colour’ will be open from 18 August to 24 September, Thursday/Friday 2pm to 8pm and Saturday/Sunday 12pm to 6pm. FREE entry, donation welcome. Please download (and share) our flyer for more information by clicking on this LINK.   …

Spring 2023 courses online

The program for our Spring 2023 courses can be found here. All of our courses can be booked online on our webshop.

In memoriam – Dame Vivienne Westwood

Words cannot express our sorrow at the passing of our dear friend and Patron of our School, Vivienne Westwood on 29 December 2022. In the words of the @viviennewestwood Instagram post ‘The world needs people like Vivienne to make a change for the better’. She was a true heroine and did make …

WHITE Exhibition – EXTENDED

Our first exhibition has been extended at our School in London until the end of January. Our Collection by Colour, No. 1 : White Three stories of white clothes told through textiles and dress in our collection: Ruffs, Muslin and New Fashions from Old. Dowload the brochure here: WHITE EXHIBITION 02/12/22 …

New release : Patterns of Fashion 2

The wait is finally over! We are please to announce the release of the new edition of the second volume from the original ‘Patterns of Fashion’ series by Janet Arnold.   Patterns of Fashion 2 has 166 pages, with full colour images of the garments and scale patterns in colour. There are …