The objects contained in archives inform our understanding of fashion as historical and cultural element, embedded in the ways in which society fostered interactions, negotiated its progress, and  moved into its designated – global? – future.

As we discussed many times, the EFHA digital archive allows to virtually move between collections that are different in chronology, geography, provenance and purpose. researching in our database allows the freedom to build research paths to recover the past, understand the present and imagine the future.

Back in December, the students of contemporary design cultures at IUAV University of Venice, led by Dr Elena Fava, explored the EFHA Archive and responded with special capsule curations representing they experience, research and interests in discovering something new about fashion starting from what we value as heritage.

The workshop consisted in the exploration of the EFHA database to build a research path that substantiated – with objects, data and images – a reflection on some key words related to issues addressed in the course of contemporary design cultures: time; inspiration; originality; copy; creative languages; identity; history; past; future; radical approach.

Each group chose a theme and developed a research path in the archive, selecting the best objects and articulating the reasons why these objects were significant with respect to the chosen theme.

Out of many interesting projects, we selected the three that looked particularly mature and ready to be showcased on our Journal and the EFHA social media platforms.

The workshop consisted precisely in this: the exploration of the EFHA database to build a research path that substantiated – with objects, data and images – a reflection on some key words related to issues addressed in the course of contemporary design cultures: time; inspiration; originality; copy; creative languages; identity; history; past; future; radical approach.

Each group chose a theme and developed a research path in the archive, selecting the best objects to represent it and trying to articulate the reasons why these objects were linked to each other, or in any case significant with respect to the chosen theme.

Stay tuned to discover the fascinating journeys the students took into the EFHA archive.