The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute will be launching a new exhibit called “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion” next month, which will provide a multi-sensory experience for visitors. The exhibit will feature 250 items from the institute’s archive that are being revived from years of slumber, some of which are in delicate states and will be displayed lying in glass coffins. The exhibit will open to the public on May 10, with celebrity guests getting the first look at the Met Gala hosted by Zendaya, Jennifer Lopez, Bad Bunny, and Chris Hemsworth on May 6.
One of the highlights of the exhibit is a coat designed by Jonathan Anderson of LOEWE, which has been planted with oat, rye, and wheatgrass and is currently “growing” in a tent at the museum. The coat will be displayed in its green glory for the first week, after which it will be replaced by a dried-out version. The exhibit will be organized around themes of earth, air, and water, as well as the various senses. There will be a garden gallery where visitors can sample scents connected to various garments, creating an olfactory history of the garment based on the person who wore it and their environment.
The exhibit will also include garments that create sound, such as an embroidered gown by Alexander McQueen with razor clams that were collected by McQueen himself. Curators made a duplicate of the gown and recorded the sound of the embroidery in an echo-free chamber at Binghamton University, capturing the minutiae of movements. Silk taffeta garments will also be featured in a gallery where visitors can hear the specific sound silk makes, known as “scroop.” The exhibit aims to enhance the viewing experience with animations featuring details of the garments that cannot be seen with the naked eye.
In an attempt to incorporate the sense of touch, the exhibit will feature 3D scanning technology to recreate the embroidery of a delicate 17th-century Jacobean bodice on wallpaper that visitors can feel with their hands. The same technique will be used to recreate the feel of a Dior dress, allowing visitors to interact with the garments in a tactile way. The exhibit aims to change the traditional museum experience by engaging all the senses and providing a more immersive and interactive environment for visitors.
The curator, Andrew Bolton, hopes that the technologies used in this exhibit will become a norm for the Costume Institute, allowing them to build a database of the sounds and smells of garments before they enter the collection. This will capture the garments in their “last gasp” of life before they become museum pieces, preserving their essence in a more dynamic and living form. The exhibit “Sleeping Beauties: Reawakening Fashion” will run from May 10 to September 2, 2024, offering a unique and innovative approach to showcasing fashion and engaging visitors on a sensory level.
