The Metropolitan Museum of Art announced the “Women Dressing Women” exhibition at the Costume Institute. On view at The Met Fifth Avenue from December 7, 2023, through March 3, 2024, the show will celebrate the creativity and artistic legacy of women designers whose fashions are represented in the Museum’s permanent collection.

Women Dressing Women will explore the work of both widely celebrated and lesser-known women designers and women-led fashion houses from the 20th century to the present, surfacing a series of intergenerational conversations that underscore ideas related to women’s social progress as charted through fashion. The exhibition will uncover new information about understudied designers and houses that were influential during their activity, expanding upon the canon of Western fashion by highlighting rare works from The Costume Institute’s collection, some of which will be on view at The Met for the first time.

The Carl and Iris Barrel Apfel Gallery will introduce a pantheon of women designers who worked in Paris, the historical center of the stratified haute couture industry, displaying an area of strength in The Costume Institute’s early 20th-century collection. Through highlighting notions of visibility, the rise of the couturier, and the collective nature of design, this section will examine the ways in which fashion served as a vehicle to provide early forms of financial, social, and creative autonomy for women.

The Lizzie and Jonathan Tisch Gallery will expand the lineage of female designers across time and geography, using the premise of agency to reveal how generational shifts led to new opportunities for women. Objects and makers represented in this section will demonstrate different entry points to the fashion industry through adjacent areas of the arts and the cultivation of autonomous environments with the rise of independent shops and boutique culture. Garments by contemporary designers working from the 1960s to the present will emphasize the ways in which fashion has served as a site of political and bodily expression, engaging with notions of identity and choice.

The exhibition will close by highlighting stories of absence or omission through the presentation of objects by designers whose work has only recently begun to receive widespread credit and recognition, such as Ann Lowe, who designed Jacqueline Bouvier’s wedding dress for her marriage to then-Senator John F. Kennedy in 1953, and Adèle Henriette Nigrin Fortuny, who was instrumental in the design of the famed “Delphos” gown, first introduced in 1909.

Iconic pieces by well-known designers will be on display, including garments by Sarah Burton, Gabrielle Chanel, Ann Demeulemeester, Elizabeth Hawes, and Jeanne Lanvin. Pieces representing designers who have maintained a significant presence in The Costume Institute’s collection and exhibition history, such as Germaine Émilie Krebs, who created under the names Alix and Mme. Grès; Miuccia Prada; and Elsa Schiaparelli will also be featured.

The exhibition is organized by The Costume Institute’s associate curator Mellissa Huber and guest co-curator Karen Van Godtsenhoven.

Max Hollein, the Met’s Marina Kellen French director and ceo, said that the exhibition will continue the Museum’s dedication to amplifying historically underappreciated voices while celebrating the work of those who have become household names. While the Wendy Yu curator in charge, Andrew Bolton added: “Women have been instrumental to the success of The Costume Institute since its inception, its founding members include several inspiring women, and the department remains dedicated to recognizing the artistic, technical, and social achievements of women."

Women Dressing Women
December 07, 2023 – March 03, 2024
The Met Fifth Avenue Galleries
980-981 New York
www.metmuseum.org

Photo: Rei Kawakubowith models in Comme des garçons (ph Takeyoshi Tanuma, courtesy The Metropolitan museum of art)