I know everyone feels passionately about this topic. Whatever our individual feelings may be the truth is these days museums themselves are selling massive amounts of items on ebay and other places too I imagine.
I have a particular interest in victorian corsets and in searching for extant examples I realized just how many "historic" items were being sold out of museum stock. The museums either can's store or maintain them themselves or just have too many. These things cost money to preserve and many museums are struggling. I'm not sure people are aware of how much stuff is literally rotting in museum stores where they can't afford the maintenance of said items. Every museum doesn't have acid free boxes and climate controlled rooms. That's but a dream for most smaller museums. Is it better rotting in a box in a museum basement or being repurposed somehow in the hands of someone who will use it. Whether that be for just making a new pattern or reusing the actual item. I think better to not let it rot away! Tanya _______________________________________________ h-costume mailing list h-costume@mail.indra.com http://mail.indra.com/mailman/listinfo/h-costume
