During the summer months of 2012 MoDiP has been busy
supporting the work of the summer schools and our International students by
providing access to the collections in a number of ways.
In July we were asked to provide a collection of brightly
coloured artefacts to support the Fashion Studies Summer School work in trend
and colour development. Plastics are ideally suited to this – the use of colour
is something they demonstrate supremely well and by selecting artefacts from
different eras we were able to show the students from Brazil how everyday
objects reflect popular trends in colour and styling.
Summer School visitors from Japan benefited from being able to see a range of garments from the MoDiP collection at close quarters. They included this 1920’s dress with gold metalwork; a stunning black and pink layered 1950s dress, a 1960s shift dress and a pair of men’s platform shoes from the 1970s. The garments were selected as being typical examples of their era and, together with other artefacts from the museum’s fashion collection, outlined the changes in fashion in the UK over a 50 year period.
AUCB’s international students were given a brief introduction to the Museum and its collections when they visited the Plastics for Gold exhibition in August. Coinciding with the Olympic and Paralympic Games the exhibition provided an opportunity to discuss something of topical interest and to encourage students to talk about design. Using the ‘Family questionnaire’, designed to get visitors to look at specific points of interest in the exhibition, as a starting point, MoDiP staff spent an enjoyable hour getting to know the International students and helping them to realise the value of the collection as a primary research resource.
