The Textile Museum
The Textile Museum in Washington DC has the largest collection of historic textiles in the USA. The Americas are were textile manufacturers began to mass produce clothing for the new world.
The Textile Museum is dedicated to furthering the understanding of mankind's creative achievements in the textile arts. As a museum, it is committed to its role as a center of excellence in the scholarly research, conservation, interpretation and exhibition of textiles, with particular concern for the artistic, technical and cultural significance of its collections. The mission is pursued through development and maintenance of collections, records and a library, as well as through scholarly research, exhibitions, publications and educational programs. In all of this, the standard of excellence established by the Museum's founder, George Hewitt Myers, will be maintained. The Textile Museum exibits include early textile mills in New England
The history of the Textile museum starts in 1925 when George Hewitt Myers founded The Textile Museum with a collection of 275 rugs and 60 related textiles. Myers collected actively for the Museum until his death in 1957, at which time the collection had grown to encompass the textile arts of Africa, Asia and Latin America. In Myers' time, the Museum was open by appointment only and received several hundred visitors annually. Today, The Textile Museum is one of the world's foremost specialized art museums and receives 25,000 to 35,000 visitors each year from around the world.
The Textile Museum is housed in two historic buildings in the Kalorama neighborhood of Washington, D.C. Visitors enter the Museum through the former home of the Museum's founding family which was designed by John Russell Pope in 1913. Since 1925, the Museum's galleries have been located in an adjacent building purchased by George Hewitt Myers for this purpose. Large gardens behind the buildings are open to the public during Museum hours.See Textile Machinery from years past,Handloom Silk Textile.
THE TEXTILE MUSEUM
2320 S Street, NW
Washington, DC 20008-4088
Phone: (202) 667-0441
Fax: (202) 483-0994
American Textile History Museum
Not your run of the mill experience, the magic of spinning and weaving comes to life in this renovated historic textile machine factory located on the Western Canal in Lowell. Here, visitors can discover a colorful segment of U.S. history in the ongoing exhibition, "Textiles in America," which draws on the Museum’s unparalleled collection of textiles and decorative arts, tools, machinery, and workplace artifacts to show how people lived, dressed and worked from the 18th century through the 20th. More than 500 artifacts are used in imaginative period settings and gallery displays to tell America's story through the art, science and history of our textiles. Lowell MA and Many areas north and west of Boston Were the center of the textile industries up until the 1970s when environmental concerns closed many factories. Many textile manufacturers have moved overseas but some can still be found in the USA
491 Dutton Street
Lowell
(978) 441-0400
Textile Mills in the 1800's
Textile Mills in the 1800's were mostly based in New England. Malden Mills in Massachusetts was a major player until they suffered a major Fire in the 1990s and again a few years later. The have rebuilt and are owned by former employee's.
Another big player in the 1800's was Fall River knitting Mills in Fall River Massachusetts. Textile Mills in the 1800's were strung out accross New England and along RT 2. Pawtucket Textile Industry was a major employer in the Textile Mills in the 1800's and early textile mills in New England
