Theatre: Costume Design
This guide provides links to basic theatre research: history, design, acting, production, scripts, videos, and careers.
Costume Resources in Books and DVDs
Pattern: 100 Fashion Designers, 10 Curators by Marriott Library, Level 2, Fine Arts Collection: TT507.P355 2013
History of costume, 3100 B.C.-1992This DVD-ROM provides digital images for 5000 years of costume history. You must log into your library account to request it from the ARC (automated retrieval center).
When preparing to design costumes for a show, you take into consideration many factors: the play’s setting location, time period, and characters’ professions, to name a few. The same should be true for doing costume design research. Go to the main Production & Design page for suggestions on how to do this.
To find costume and fashion-related books at Marriott Library, go to the Library Catalog's Advanced Search mode, change the drop-down menu option from "Any" to "Subject". Copy your choice from the suggested Subjects below and paste it into the Subject search box.
- costume, clothing and dress, fashion, clothing trade
- theatrical makeup, face painting, masks, hairdressing
- folk art, material culture, social life and customs
- millinery, tailoring, dressmaking
- textile fabrics, weaving, tapestry, wool, dyes and dyeing
- jewelry, dress accessories
- hats, headgear, gloves, shoes, boots, coats
- fashion in motion pictures
Costume Design Web Resources
Please send recommendations for other Costume-related websites to include on this page to: greg.hatch@utah.edu
- Commercial Pattern Archive"A unique tool for researchers and designers to recreate or date clothing from 1868 to 2000."
- The Costume Gallery"A central location on the web for fashion and costume"
- "The History of Costume" by Braun & Schneider.Digitized version of historical costume renderings published in a German magazine titled "Münchener Bilderbogen" from 1861-1880.
- Vintage Fashion GuildWebsite of an international organization dedicated to the promotion and preservation of vintage fashion.
- Know Your Shirt Fabric PatternsShirt patterns are often enhanced or can be a combination of different patterns. These are the classic pattern choices.
Costume Resources in Library Databases
You'll find visual examples and historical research articles on fashion, clothing, accessories, fabrics, textiles, and even costume renderings in the databases listed below.
- The Vogue ArchiveComprises every issue--more than 400,000 pages--in high resolution color from 1892 to today. Search by designer, photographer, model, author, advertiser, label/brand, article of clothing, fabric/material, color, and more!
- ARTstorProvides curated collections of more than 2 million images of art, architecture, artifacts, and primary documents, including costume and set renderings, playbills, production photos, etc. Time periods range from ancient to modern and geographic locations from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe. (Off-campus? Read "More" information below.)
- Using ARTstor for Fashion & Costume ResearchGuide to featured collections and recommended keyword search terms to find fashion & costume images in ARTstor.
- Art Full TextIndexes and abstracts articles from periodicals published throughout the world in virtually all areas of art, architecture, and archaeology. Full-text coverage for selected periodicals is also included.
- Early English Books OnlineContains the scanned digital images of over 125,000 books printed in England, Ireland, Scotland, Wales and British North America, and works in English printed elsewhere, from 1473-1700.
- New York Times HistoricalFull-text coverage of The New York Times going back to the first issue: 1851-2019
- ProQuest NewsstandCovers: approx. 1985-present. Regional and national U.S. newspapers, and international newspapers.
Fashion, Costume, & Textile Museums & Archives
The American, Canadian, and British museums linked below provide some images of their vast and varied collections. These are not the only museums with fashion, costume, and textile collections, so consider exploring museums in other, international locations.
- Vogue Paris: 1920-1940Browsable, page-by-page, back run of Vogue Paris. Digitized and provided by the National Library of France. (Note, pages may load slowly.)
- Museum of Performance & DesignThe first museum in the country dedicated exclusively to the performing arts and theatrical design. The Museum collects, preserves, and makes accessible performance and design materials that reflect our diverse culture.
- The Bata Shoe Museum"Discover the treasures of Toronto's...shoe museum. Hundreds of shoes (from a collection numbering over 10,000) are on exhibit. The Museum celebrates the style and function of footwear, [ranging] from Chinese bound foot shoes and ancient Egyptian sandals to chestnut-crushing clogs and glamourous platforms. Over 4,500 years of history and a collection of 20th-century celebrity shoes are reflected in the semi-permanent exhibition."
- CSU-Fresno Theatre Arts Garment CollectionTheatre students at California State University at Fresno are researching and photographing vintage clothing pieces for a digital archive.
- Clothing & Accessories collection at Smithsonian Institute, National Museum of American History"One of the nation's foremost collections of men's, women's, and children's garments. Beyond garments, the collections encompass jewelry, handbags, hair dryers, dress forms, hatboxes, suitcases, salesmen's samples, and thousands of fashion prints, photographs, and original illustrations. More than 30,000 artifacts represent the changing appearance of Americans from the 1700s to the present day."
- Costume & Textiles collection at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art"The collection is encyclopedic, ranging from ancient Peruvian mantles to European tapestries, from 100 B.C. to the present....More than 25,000 objects, including approximately 6,000 textiles. "
- The Costume Institute at The Metropolitan Museum of Art"The Costume Institute houses a collection of more than thirty-one thousand costumes and accessories spanning five continents and as many centuries."
- Dress and Fashion collection at Museum of London"Internationally recognised for its quality and diversity. The aims of the dress collection are: to represent London’s role as a centre for the fashion and clothing industry, from education through to design, production, promotion, retail and wear; and to reflect the diversity of life in London, recording and collecting the clothing of all London’s communities There are over 24,000 objects in the collection, dating from the Tudor period to the present."
- Fashion and Textile Museum: The Academy for Fashion, Textiles & Jewellery"A cutting edge centre for contemporary fashion, textiles and jewellery in London. Founded by iconic British designer Zandra Rhodes, the centre houses permanent and changing exhibitions exploring elements of fashion, textile and jewellery."
- Fashion Museum (formerly Museum of Costume, Bath, UK)The Fashion Museum collection was started by Doris Langley Moore, a collector, costume designer and author. The earliest pieces in the collection are embroidered shirts and gloves from about 1600. The most up-to-date pieces in the collection are from 2008.
- Kyoto Costume Institute"KCI systematically collects and preserves outstanding examples of western clothing through the centuries, as well as the documents and other items related to this area of study." The digital archives displays 200 of the approximately 11,000 items in the collection.
- The Textile Museum"The Textile Museum expands public knowledge and appreciation – locally, nationally and internationally – of the artistic merits and cultural importance of the world’s textiles."
- Textile Museum of CanadaWith more than 12,000 objects from more than 200 countries and regions, the TMC's permanent collection celebrates cultural diversity and includes traditional fabrics, garments, carpets and related artifacts such as beadwork and basketry.
- Fashion, Jewellery and Accessories collection at the Victoria and Albert Museum"The collection covers fashionable dress from the 17th century to the present day, with the emphasis on progressive and influential designs from the major fashion centres of Europe. The V&A collections also include accessories such as jewellery, gloves and handbags."
