Fashion and Textile Museum to celebrate needlework with new exhibition

The Fashion and Textile Museum in London is to highlight the versatility and skill of the Royal School of Needlework (RSN) and its 150-year history in its upcoming fashion exhibition.

Opening on April 1, ‘150 Years of the Royal School of Needlework: Crown to Catwalk’ will feature more than 120 embroidered pieces and design ephemera spanning from 1872 to the present day, to explore the history of fashion and embroidery through the eye of a needle.

The exhibition presents a varied range of commissions the RSN has undertaken from regal pieces on loan from the Royal Collection, alongside churchwork, military applications, and contemporary collaborations with designers such as E.Tautz and Nicholas Oakwell.

Presented thematically, the exhibition will take the visitor on a journey through the many different elements of the RSN, starting with the early beginnings of the school in the Victorian era and its involvement in the Arts and Crafts movement.

Visitors will then be introduced to RSN’s relationship with the nation, its involvement in embroidering royal pieces, such as the 1937 Robe of Estate of Queen Elizabeth, The Queen Mother, which has not been exhibited since the 1990s, and Edward VII’s Coronation Cope. Before finding out about the RSN’s commissions, including examples of the school’s lingerie department, which operated until the 1940s, and its links to the military including teaching returning soldiers how to stitch as an active therapy.

Royal School of Needlework to celebrate 150 years with an exhibition in London

The exhibition will also feature several modern collaborations and partnership projects that the RSN has worked on, including a dress from the Eco-Fashion campaign ‘Red Carpet Green Dress’ worn by Naomie Harris on the Oscar red carpet in 2013 and a dress designed by Michael Badger and realised by Vivienne Westwood’s studio, which was embroidered by a team of 22 experts from the RSN logging 680 hours of hand embroidery.

Also on display will be a unique bomber jacket, part of Patrick Grant’s E.Tautz AW14 collection, a Nicholas Oakwell dress worn by Erin O’Connor for Vogue, and a sample of the Duchess of Cambridge’s wedding dress on which the RSN Embroidery Studio worked with Sarah Burton of Alexander McQueen.

Throughout the exhibition, there will also be an emphasis on exploring the work of past students, from past apprentices and future tutor students, many of whom are retained by the RSN and have become expert tutors, to degree students who have gone on to work in couture fashion houses such as Alexander McQueen and on films such as Murder on the Orient Express.

There will also be a section dedicated to demonstrating how stitching can improve wellbeing, featuring printed montages of the NHS embroidered hearts of appreciation project and the ‘Postcards from Home’ campaign the RSN ran throughout the Covid-19 pandemic. As well as a look at the school's ongoing projects such as the RSN Stitch Bank, a repository that aims to digitally conserve and preserve every stitch in the world.

Head of exhibitions at the Fashion and Textile, Dennis Nothdruft said in a statement: “The Royal School of Needlework has been instrumental in preserving this nation’s traditional needlework skills; honouring the past whilst ensuring their place in the future, marrying contemporary design with peerless technique. The Fashion and Textile Museum is delighted to collaborate with the RSN to present 150 Years of the Royal School of Needlework: Crown to Catwalk, a fitting celebration of this important and cherished national institution.”

‘150 Years of the Royal School of Needlework: Crown to Catwalk’ will run from April 1 to September 4.