Project Dress: An Overview of Working with the Textile Finds from the Vasa Collection

Summary

This is an abstract from the session entitled "Expressions of Social Space and Identity: Interior Furnishings and Clothing from the Swedish Warship Vasa of 1628." , at the 2020 annual meeting of the Society for Historical Archaeology.

The Dress Project started in 2017 and after two years we have an idea of the size and scope of the collection, even if piecing together thousands of fragments after 333 years underwater has its challenges, and building a methodology for the documentation was a necessary start. The documentation so far shows that the collection consists of both men’s and women’s clothing from many levels of society, with fashion trends from the late 16th century to the 1620s. The majority of the preserved material is wool, with some silk and a few fragments of linen. Most of the material is woven, but there is also some felt, knitting and nålbindning. Much of the clothing shows evidence of wear and repair. This paper presents an overview of the collection as a whole and what we believe it will be able to tell us about dress and its interpretation.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• Expressions of Social Space and Identity: Interior Furnishings and Clothing from the Swedish Warship Vasa of 1628.   •
• Society for Historical Archaeology 2020

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Individual & Institutional Roles

Contact(s): Society for Historical Archaeology

Record Identifiers

PaperId(s): 780