Museums, Galleries, Collections and educational resources
Allhallows Museum Honiton Lace Web Site: provides illustrated articles on Honiton lace (Devon, UK)
Armley Mills Industrial Museum Exhibits with an emphasis on textile history and engine and locomotive manufacture including water wheels, a steam engine and the great spinning 'mules'. Armley Mills used to be the largest woolen mill in the country. (Leeds UK)
Blackwell Museum has a sampler collection
Canadian Museum of Civilization holds a large textiles collection. No wonder this website has won a number of awards you get lost for hours in it.
Cleaveland Museum of Art (USA)
Colonial Williamsburg Foundation:This site has a search function which takes you into many of the nooks and crannies of the site. A large selection of needlework samplers are to be discovered.
Colour Museum Situated in a former wool warehouse this museum focuses on the history and use of color in textiles by the Society of Dyers and Colourists. Even if you can't get there in person their website has a number of educational interactive pieces.(Bradford, UK).
Como Silk Museum, Italy
Cooper-Hewitt, National Museum of Design: holds a large collection of artifacts. Information about the extensive textiles collection held as part of the Smithsonian. (USA)
Deutsches Museum has an exhibit on textile technology.(Germany)
Fiberscene Gallery - online exhibitions of contemporary textiles (USA)
Freer and Sackler galleries is a collection strong in Asian Arts with more than a thousand objects from the collection are now available online. As part of the Smithsonian its well worth a look. (USA)
Galleria delle Tappezzerie an online gallery of tapestry works preserved in churches, cathedrals and monasteries all over the world.
Heavens' Embroidered Cloths: One Thousand Years of Chinese Textiles, a selection of images from an exhibition of Chinese textiles on display in 1995 at the Hong Kong Museum of Art.
Home Textile Tool Museum, USA
Kyoto National Museum for searches on Japanese textiles
Los Angeles County Museum of Art has much of its collection online use the search function to find textiles of interest.
Louvre (Paris France)
Macclesfield Silk Museum, Once the silk center of England the collections are of interest to anyone who has a passion for textiles. An emphasis on the 19th cent there are 40,000 examples of fabric woven and printed by local manufacturers. In the virtual exhibitions section of the site "The Discovery of silk" is a brief illustrated article on the history of silk.(Cheshire UK)
Musée des Arts Décoratifs; Musée des Arts de la Mode et du Textile the textile collection houses a collection of roughly 30,000 costumes from the 18th century to the present. The Arts Décoratifs is a huge collection of 220,000 items for those interested in interior design, furniture, objets d'arts, wallpaper, tapestries, ceramics, glassware, and toys. This site provides tourist information about the museum. (France)
Musee McCord English and french versions available. The site is buggy which is very annoying but since the collection holds 16,400 items of dress and accessories its worth being a little patient. (Canada)
Museum of Costume in Bath: This museum and resource centre features some of its collection on line and brief a monthly article about items that are of historical interest.(UK)
Museum of International Folk Art which is part of the Museum of Mexico has articles on folk textiles.
Museum of Textiles Exclusively devoted to the collection, exhibition and documentation of textiles.(Canada)
National Gallery of Art (USA)
National Museum of American History Part of the Smithsonian which has a large textile collection. It also has a section on computers which is interesting for anyone interested in the history of technology.(USA)
National Museum of Japanese History the web site introduces the museum's permanent and special exhibitions about Japanese history and culture.
Not Your Grandmother's Quilt Anymore at the Kentucky Museum (USA)
Quilters Hall of Fame - honoring outstanding quilters
Ransom Center Online exhibit page
San Jose Museum of Quilts & Textiles
Sheelin Irish lace Museum traces the history of Lace-making in Ireland provided a virtual tour and information about the museum
Structure and Surface: Contemporary Japanese textiles an online exhibition organized by The Museum of Modern Art, New York, in collaboration with The Saint Louis Art Museum.(USA)
Textile Routes of Europe connects different European regions in a series of thematic routes. Following links lead to numerous large and smaller museums, institutes and educational resources. You can also choose other thematic routes such as Events, Culture, Heritage, Production and Education/Research, each subdivided into detailed categories.
Victorian and Albert Museum: One of the great decorative arts museums of the world (UK)
When Silk was Gold Central Asian and Chinese Textiles in The Cleveland and Metropolitan Museums of Art Exhibition held in October 1997 (Illustrated article)(USA)
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