Women’s History Month

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Image features turquoise colored book enclosure with straight sides and arched top; the title, "Corona De Rosas" above "Maria de Los Angeles" and "Purgatory Pie Press", all printed in black ink. Enclosure bound with a red ribbon. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Corona de Rosas
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. A recent acquisition in our library collection is the beautifully rendered artist book, Corona de Rosas (Crown of Roses), with illustrations of women in beautiful colorful flowered dresses. A collaborative work by artist Maria de los Angeles, and Esther...
Image features: Crisp pleats in a series of alternating diagonals form a chevron pattern in this sheer scarf of mauve, pale green and pale blue. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Origami Pleat
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. Origami Pleat was designed in 1997 by Reiko Sudo, one of Japan’s most important contemporary textile designers and co-founder of Nuno Corporation. The textile is a contemporary interpretation of centuries-old hand pleating. It is made by creating...
Image shows wallpaper pattern composed of crystal structures colored in blue and green against a white background. Please scroll down for further information on this object.
New Designs for the Atomic Age
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. This mid-century design of crystalline structures takes on the appearance of falling snowflakes, with the varying scale of the crystals giving the design some dimension. The design is fresh and still appears modern today with its strong...
Image features drawing showing three grotesque profiles of men in long wigs, outlined with scratching, exploratory lines imitating roughly drawn grotesques by William Hogarth. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Jane Ireland: Faithful Copies and a Famous Hoax in 18th-century London
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. Jane Ireland and her sister Anna Maria were artists and print-makers in 18th-century London. Like many early women artists in Europe—to whom formal training was rarely available—the Ireland sisters learned their craft from their father. Samuel Ireland...
Image features key chain made from assembled blue anodized aluminum bolt, red and gold anodized aluminum washers, and violet anodized aluminum nut. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Nuts and Bolts
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. A 1954 article in Women’s Wear Daily announced the arrival of Patricia Smith’s novel jewelry designs, noting, “highly colored, glamorized nuts, screws, bolts and other industrial products make unusual anodized aluminum jewelry by the new firm of...
Length of fabric in which squares of various woven and embroidered white Nuno fabrics are machine stitched to a water-soluble base cloth which is then dissolved away, leaving an open ground with 'floating' scraps. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object
Tradition and Technology
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. Tsugihagi was designed by Reiko Sudo, one of Japan’s most important contemporary textile designers. Educated at Musashino Art University, she and Junichi Arai (Japanese, 1932–2017) were the co-founders in 1984 of the Japanese company and store, NUNO,...
Image features a five part coffee service. The surfaces and forms of this set are based on the circle, from the rust-red surface decoration to the cutouts in the handles and lids of the vessels. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Coffee Talk: Celebrating Jutta Sika
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. Today’s blog post was written by Adriane Dalton and originally published on September 17, 2013. Born in 1877, Jutta Sika was an Austrian designer working in a variety of different media. Sika received formal training in both...
Image features a tornado-like object composed of metal strips at center; text in blue above in a wavy line; text on either side, and photographs of buildings. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
In the Eye of the Tornado: Rethinking the Limits of Design
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. As design director for her alma mater, Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, California, from 1991 to 1996, designer and artist Rebeca Méndez (b. 1962, Mexico City; active Los Angeles) played a key role in re-envisioning...
Subtle monochrome pattern in grays gives impression of color unevenly applied due to folding of the substrate. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
A Fashionable Collaboration
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. Knoll Luxe was launched in 2008 as a luxury fabric division of Knoll Textiles. The brand utilizes a global network of specialized and highly skilled textile mills to realize fabrics that combine classic modernism with a strong...
Image features eyeglass-like wearable technology with titanium frame that is a plain band on the left side and on the right side holds a clip-on camera, computer, battery, and speaker. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
O.K. Glass…
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. When Isabelle Olsson, head of Industrial Design for Wearables, arrived at Google she was given the brief to make the existing clunky Google Glass prototype (a cellphone’s motherboard, a battery, and a Pico projector all taped to...
Image features a central woman in brown-ish black and white clerical habit holding a book in her left hand and a cross on a chain in her right. Her headpiece is heart-shaped around her face, connected to an elaborate, rough-like neckpiece that extends over her shoulders. The dress has puffy sleeves with a full, floor-length skirt. Feathery patches of white paint fill the background around the figure. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Costuming Beyond Errors
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. Theoni V. Aldredge designed costumes for the stage and screen with a career spanning six decades. At the height of her career, thousands of her fashions graced Broadway stages.[1] Aldredge was driven. After graduating from the American...
Image features the Knoll Wall Collection sample book with the Niji wallcovering designed by Jhane Barnes showing through the clear plastic cover. This woven textile contains a great variety of muted colors woven together. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Wall Fashions by Jhane Barnes
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. Jhane Barnes is best known for her beautifully colored and structured fabrics, and I have always been a fan of her men’s fashion, but she designed furniture and wallcoverings as well. She established her fashion company in...
Various blocks of ikat in indigo blue, tan and off-white. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
Studied Beauty: Textile Panel by Ethel Stein
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. Today’s blog post was written by Lucy Commoner and originally published February 17, 2013. Ethel Stein died this month at 100. Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum is fortunate to have in its collection three textiles designed and...
Image features a C-shaped bracelet with large oval crystal stone clasp. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object. Please scroll down to read the blog post about this object.
The First Lady of Scandinavian Design
In celebration of Women’s History Month, March Object of the Day posts highlight women designers in the collection. This cuff-like bracelet with large oval stone clasp was designed by Vivianna Torun Bülow-Hübe in 1968. It is made of silver and rutilated smoky quartz. The bracelet’s simple form is emblematic of Torun’s philosophy that jewelry should...
Image features a woven chair printed in white ink on a black background, while an abstracted shadow of white squares floats behind it. Each woven area illustrated slightly differently; the splat of the chair has a wider, lattice pattern, while the seat has a tightly woven cane.
Lattice Lithograph
In 1946, the twenty year old artist Ruth Asawa entered the renowned, experimental Black Mountain College, where she studied for three years under mentors such as Josef Albers, Merce Cunningham and Buckminster Fuller. Born in California to Japanese immigrants, Asawa spent her childhood working on her family’s farm, until 1942, when the entire Asawa family...