Costume Storage

After learning how to properly store costumes in several museums, I decided to take my practice home to use on my own historic garments. I use acid free tissue paper, buffered is acceptable for cotton or linen textiles, unbuffered for silk or wool objects; and acid free museum grade storage boxes. Below is my process.

Step 1

Begin first by making a series of "Sausages" out of your acid free tissue paper to line the bottom of your box. Accordion fold the paper long ways and scrunch up on the left and right to keep the folds in place.

Step 2

Place your item on top of the sausages, any parts that fall over the edge, I temporarily lay paper under. Place a sheet inside the dress between the front and back fabric. YOu can see that the hem of teh dress aligns with the botton of the box.

Step 3

Create another sausage and place it at the point where the garment will fold into the box on both sides.

Step 4

Create another sausage and place where the top portion of the garment ill fold into the box. Using sausaged tissue paper like his will put less stress and creases on the garment when it is folded. I hav also placed tissue paper in the arms of the garment as well, up to the shoulders, to keep their shape.

Step 5

Fold over the garment on the sausage and a piece of flat tissue paper. Then cover it with one full sheet of tissue paper. If stacking more than one item in a large box, make sure that the heaviest weighted garment is on the bottom. I will stack no more than three garments in one box due to limited storage space. Preferably, each garment should have its own box.