A Dress For All Seasons

200 hundred years of ‘seasonal’ dress and accessories from the Olive Matthews Collection. Accustomed to weather that can shift from blazing sunshine to a torrential downpour in the time it takes to set up a deckchair, it’s perhaps not surprising that we have created such a wide range of clothing and accessories in our efforts to survive the somewhat “unpredictable” British climate.

The items on display cover a period of two hundred years, and range from an eighteenth century silk waistcoat, with intricate tambour work embroidery, to a bright yellow PVC raincoat from the early 1970s.

The seasonal theme has provided an opportunity to showcase some of the more unusual items in the collection, including a pair of ice skates worn by its founder, Olive Mary Matthews (1887-1979) in circa 1900, and a wonderful knitted bikini from circa 1948-1951.