Archives unlock fashion on film

(c) Screen Search Fashion

Screen Search Fashion

is an online resource which provides a guide to aspects of 1920s and 1930s fashion and dress as depicted in non-fiction film from the collections of Screen Archive South East(in collaboration with the Royal College of Art.

You can see what people wore on holiday, or at the summer fete or carnival. There's also a section dedicated to work clothes, including unforms. It's great to see original garments wore by ordinary people in real life - something even the best-researched costume drama can not do.

The clips are accompanied by photos of relevant items of clothing from local museums. It would be fantastic if, in turn, the clips could be screened within these museums' displays. I love looking at fashion collections in museums but nothing can compare to seeing how garments were worn, what they looked like in motion, and for which occasions they were worn.

It's a fascinating site to explore - I hope that over the next few years they're given the resources needed to extend the site to include film from the 1940s to the present day (so long as that doesn't include any of my family's 1970s home movies!).