From Archive to Exhibition Threads 2025

During a university placement at Sunny Bank Mills, Beth Allen had the opportunity to spend time researching the archive at Sunny Bank Mills Museum & Archive.  She had the chance to bring her work to life at the Threads Festival, which took place on the 17^th and 18^th May 2025 in Sunny Bank Mills. The aim was to plan, design and set up displays that showed the design process once used at the Mills, focusing on the development and story of making a suit, which would be presented in the Museum & Archive during the Festival.

Beth – One of my responsibilities was to create a display which traced the journey of a suit and how they are typically made. This included images and text to explain the design process, which were surrounded by fabrics and patterns found in the archive. My main responsibility for the exhibition displays was to show the journey of design that used to take place in the Mills, which had come from my research with Susan Gaunt. We wanted visitors to be able to understand the whole story of the design process, starting with the weave card and the range ticket detailing the structure of the fabric, through to the range blanket and finally the finished suit.

Setting up the exhibition taught me how important layout and presentation are. I had to carefully consider where I placed each object, the order they were presented in and how this influences engagement with the objects and the story. Another crucial element which takes place in creating a display is labelling. I had to ensure everything I put out was clearly labelled in a way that was easy to understand. I learned that labels should offer just enough information to pull a visitor in while remaining easy to understand for people of all ages, backgrounds and abilities.

As a link to the suit display, we also included a section on women’s tailoring in the exhibition. Lucy Adlington kindly loaned some women’s wear garments to the exhibition, including a Zandra Rhodes coat which provided a vibrant contrast to the men’s suits on display in the exhibition. This helped expand the story highlighting a variety of tailoring heritage.

Seeing visitors walk through the displays and react to the process was one of the highlights of my placement. Most people were surprised by how many elements and work went into the development of fabric before any cutting and sewing took place. This experience made me realise how display can make technical processes accessible and engaging for people to understand even those with little to know knowledge or background in design.

Written by Beth Allen

2^nd Year student Fashion Design, Anglia Ruskin University Cambridge

Images by Joanne Crawford

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