• Home
  • Shop
  • Completed Costumes/Impressions
  • Emma and Her Dresses
  • Patterns & Kits
  • Free Patterns and Instructions

Kitty Calash

~ Confessions of a Known Bonnet-Wearer

Kitty Calash

Tag Archives: cataloging

Objectivity

06 Wednesday Sep 2017

Posted by kittycalash in Collecting, material culture, Museums

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

cataloging, collections management, data, material culture, museum collections, Yale Furniture Archive

Recently I’ve had more than my share of time to think about museums and objects, and what they mean to me and why I love them, and have dedicated my life to them, albeit a bit accidentally.

Transferware in open storage, Metropolitan Museum of Art, May 2013.

In the hours I spent alone in a curatorial office, listening to the murmur of school tours on the other side of the door, I began to see that curation and registration are means of managing the evidence locker of the future. We collect, tag, and maintain the means by which the future will understand the past, and it’s our job to be a neutral as we can—to refrain from laying the thumb of our prejudices on the scale—as we collect objects, images, and documents. It’s a game of forecasting, trying to guess what will best explain us and our time to the future, as well as Monday morning quarterbacking as we both weed and augment what was collected in the past to better reflect how we understand history now.

I was always a stickler for good data and record editing (and have raccoon-eyed photos of a catalog launch to prove it), and I make unkind sport of museum databases on a regular basis when I see misidentified and misdated objects. Good data matters—it’s everything, really—because if you don’t know what you have, and where it is, you might as well not have it. But more than that, compendia of data can show you things you didn’t expect to find.

RIFA Record 4925

Yale’s Rhode Island Furniture Archive is a good example of how a massive amount of data can be used. Take this record of side chair possibly made by John Carlile and Sons, and scroll down. That’s a lot of associated chairs. And they all look very similar. Examining the materials, especially secondary woods, of a labeled chair and comparing the style, make, and materials with other very similar chairs can help identify chairs, associate them with a maker, and provide a sense of Carlile’s production volume.

And Carlile’s easy! Looking at hundreds of pieces of furniture with some location provenance, reading probate inventories and other documents helped untangle James Halyburton or “Ally Burton” as a maker.

 

James Halyburton in the RIFA

When you can see enough things at once, you can discern patterns and better understand exactly what it is you’re seeing. Good data makes that possible, makes concrete what was once solely seen as connoisseurship, and helps bring unknown stories, unrecognized people, to light. Data analysis is a powerful tool for better understanding the past: that’s why museum collections matter, and why I think it’s so important for museums to make their data accessible. It’s one of the ways we understand our collective past.

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • Email
  • Twitter

Like this:

Like Loading...

New England Spencers

07 Saturday Feb 2015

Posted by kittycalash in Book Review, Clothing, History, Making Things, Museums, Research, Snark

≈ 7 Comments

Tags

19th century clothing, cataloging, common dress, common people, Dublin Seminar, Federal New England Fashion, Federal style, New England, Regency, Research, Spencer, Spencers, Sylvia Lewis

You may recall how tortured I was (sort of) about making a Spencer for What Cheer Day, concerned that Spencers could not be documented to Rhode Island, let alone New England. I had the same worry about the Not-Quite-Good-Enough Coat.

JDK_8210_1

Things will come to those who wait, and what came this week was the long-awaited Proceedings of the Dublin Seminar for 2010, Dressing New England. In it I found an article by Alden O’Brien, Federal New England Fashion in the Diary of Sylvia Lewis.

Sylvia Lewis [Tyler], Diary (1801-1831), MSS 2899 in the Americana Collection of the NSDAR provides the basis for O’Brien’s article and my joy. It begins routinely enough with my favorite stuff– spinning!– and carries on to knitting: stockings, mittens, gloves, a hat or two, and even “comforters,” or scarves. Shag, or thrummed, knitting is mentioned, so at least those of us interpreting the world of 1801 and later can be war.

The real excitement comes on the third page: in the winter of 1803-1804, Sylvia Lewis cuts and sews a greatcoat. Then, in 1806, she makes a green Spencer, and in 1808, a black one.

Spencer ca. 1800 French. silk. Purchase, Irene Lewisohn Trust Gift, 1991 1991.239.2

Spencer ca. 1800
French. silk. Purchase, Irene Lewisohn Trust Gift, 1991
1991.239.2

1806 is still later than I wore my Spencer. They’re shown in fashion plates of the 1790s, and here’s a pattern, too: so they’re clearly worn in Europe earlier than 1806. The similarity between the French silk spencer at the Met and fashion plates gives me confidence that they are being made and worn in the 1790s and early years of the 19th century; Spencers are also mentioned in tailoring manuals of this period.

1797, with a similar shape to the Met's French silk spencer.

1797, with a similar shape to the Met’s French silk spencer.

They’re placed in New England with written documentation, but how early are they here? And what did they look like? I know of one in a private collection which I am slavering to see, based on the description of the wool. The MFA has a few that seem to be local to Lexington, and there is one in Maine with a catalog record that shines with passive aggressive crankiness, and delights when compared to another in the same catalog. And no, I’m pretty confident that gentlemen did not wear spencers, or tailed spencers, at any time.

"wearing a spencer"
“wearing a spencer”
"she *says* its a spencer"
“she *says* its a spencer”

But there’s really good stuff in Sylvia Lewis’s diary for anyone who wants to know more about clothing production, use, and costs in early Federal New England. Even if your Library doesn’t have it, your Librarian can get a copy of the article for you through ILL or you can buy the entire proceedings here.

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • Email
  • Twitter

Like this:

Like Loading...

Animated Nature

23 Sunday Dec 2012

Posted by kittycalash in History

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

art history, cataloging, engravings, etchings, lewis walpole library

LWL-Animated Nature

LWL-Animated Nature

Let’s just have some fun, and enjoy this image. Crush that surge of jealously that you’re not cataloging with “Temporary local subject terms: Dogs — Hats — Kittens — Monkey — Muff — Squirrel.”

I am so going to catalog our carved squirrel, just so I can add squirrels to the subject headings. Look, pages of squirrel subject headings! “Squirrel Bait–Musical Group.” The Library of Congress makes everything so–logical. Safe. Controlled.

Don’t you feel better now?

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • Email
  • Twitter

Like this:

Like Loading...

Caps and Randomness

20 Thursday Dec 2012

Posted by kittycalash in Clothing, History, Museums

≈ Leave a comment

Tags

cataloging, museum collections, Museums, National Gallery of Art, Research, resources, zen cataloging

NGA- Lady Wearing a Large White Cap

NGA- Lady Wearing a Large White Cap

Sweet cap, right? It all started because it’s cold this morning here in RI and I thought about skating when I went out to get the Times, and that led to Gilbert Stuart, which led to the National Gallery.

They have a fun search option, similar to the Tate Britain’s subject-search, but not quite as elegant.
You can start with a subject search, and then add a sub category. Results (stability not guaranteed) show you things you would not have otherwise expected, and that’s one more reason to love online catalogs & databases.

NGA Screenshot

NGA Screenshot

The results give you little unexpected galleries, and the juxtaposition or similarities of the thumbnails help you see the work differently. Black dresses and white collars are prevalent on this page: why? Is this fashion alone, or are these mourning garments? they’re earlier than the Civil War, but maybe it’s time to re-read This Republic of Suffering.

NGA- Sarah Cook Arnold knitting

NGA- Sarah Cook Arnold knitting

But wait–who is this? It’s Probably Sarah Cook Arnold, Knitting. (Probably is not her name, smartypants, it’s an adverb.)

She’s knitting in the round, by the way, on three incredibly tiny pins from an invisible ball of yarn, possibly swallowed by the cat hidden in her skirts. (I know a woman who can knit with these skinny quadruple-ought pins, but they are a hazard in my hands.)

I would not have found Sarah Cook Arnold knitting without using the random subject search, nor would I have found Fabulous Cap at the top. Sometimes you need to enjoy the journey as much as the destination.

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • Email
  • Twitter

Like this:

Like Loading...

Fashion Plates & Subject Headings

30 Friday Nov 2012

Posted by kittycalash in Museums

≈ 1 Comment

Tags

cataloging, Costume, dress, fashion plates, libraries, Museums, Research, resources

Women_17901799_Plate_009Ah, the Met. You have to love them, so much wonderful material available online, and free. Collections of immeasurable depth and wealth, an incredible professional staff–this is the pinnacle, right? And yet…

They have a weakness. It’s a weakness shared by many places, but it is a major one, for the online user. It’s the lack of subject headings or dates assigned to their Library’s Digital Collections. They use OCLC’s ContentDM which has a pleasant enough interface, and fields that, in the Met’s Costume Institute Fashion Plate Collection, include Thumbnail, Title, Subject, Description, and Date.

They’re only putting data in Thumbnail (see image; I love that dress), Title, and Description. Description is what I would call Credit Line, and contains the donor name.

Title is a trifle vague. The image above is “Women 1790-1799, Plate 009.” No date, no subjects. The date is October, 1791, right there in the image, but not searchable, not sortable.

Women_17901799_Plate_049 Catalogers, I implore you: subject headings. If not subject headings, the date, please, when it is on the item. That makes the collections not only sortable, but searchable.

Enough with my lunch-too-late commentary! I’ve been immensely grateful to have a new digital plaything while waiting for the lunch room to clear, and this plate is delightful: April 1797, which was certainly blustery, if not cruel.

Mens_Wear_17901829_Plate_002And, since we’ve been on the topic of men’s wear, here’s a well-dressed gentleman and his lady in Morning Walking Dress for April 1807.

This weekend, I am off to the Farm for the Christmas Sale. Not such a pretty dress as these, but one I am pleased with nonetheless, and which (with wool petticoat, stockings, and cloak) should keep me warm–I do expect to be quite busy.

Share this:

  • Facebook
  • Pinterest
  • Email
  • Twitter

Like this:

Like Loading...
← Older posts

Kitty Calash FB

Kitty Calash FB

Kitty Calash on IGram

Prototyping. #bonnets #millinery #milliner #fashionplates #19thcenturyfashion #1800

The Etsy Shop!

Kitty Calash Swag on Teespring

Archives

Enter your email address to follow this blog and receive notifications of new posts by email.

Join 1,928 other followers

Blogroll

  • A Most Beguiling Accomplishment
  • Afroculinaria: Michael Twitty
  • British Tars
  • Clothing the Carolinas
  • Drunk Tailor
  • History Research Shenanigans
  • Kleidung um 1800
  • New Vintage Lady
  • Not Your Momma's History
  • Our Girl History
  • Picking for Pleasure
  • Places in Time
  • Ran Away From the Subscriber
  • Slave Rebellion Reenactment
  • The Hidden Wardrobe
  • The Quintessential Clothes Pen
  • Worn Through

Etsy Shop

  • Kitty Calash on Etsy

Resources

  • Casey Fashion Plate Collection, LAPL

Sutlers

  • Burnley & Trowbridge
  • Wm Booth, Draper
wordpress statistics

Creative Commons License
Kitty Calash blog by Kirsten Hammerstrom is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.

A WordPress.com Website.

  • Follow Following
    • Kitty Calash
    • Join 1,928 other followers
    • Already have a WordPress.com account? Log in now.
    • Kitty Calash
    • Customize
    • Follow Following
    • Sign up
    • Log in
    • Report this content
    • View site in Reader
    • Manage subscriptions
    • Collapse this bar
 

Loading Comments...
 

    loading Cancel
    Post was not sent - check your email addresses!
    Email check failed, please try again
    Sorry, your blog cannot share posts by email.
    %d bloggers like this: