12 June 2014

University of Wolverhampton, UK

The Centre for the History of Retailing and Distribution (CHORD) invites proposals for papers that focus on any aspect of textile and dress ‘fragments’ held in museums, historic houses, archives or other repositories, including private collections.

We invite papers both from historians and scholars whose research makes use of fragmentary textiles and dress, and from museum professionals who are responsible for their care, interpretation and display.

We welcome both proposals that focus on the insights the ‘fragments’ provide on the history of textiles and dress, and proposals that consider their value and challenges as museum objects.

Possible topics include (but are not limited to):

§  Patterns and pattern books

§  Re-used and out of context textiles

§  Off-cuts, patches, threads and spare material

§  Incomplete and fragmentary dress

§  Scraps and scrapbooks

§ Representations and uses of textile fragments

§  Samples and swatches