To Dress

So, this past Saturday was the perfect day for a museum stroll downtown, as the weather was sunny and cool and we couldn't let that go to waste, right? Benaki Museum holds a cool exhibition about clothing, from contemporary dresses to traditional costumes from Afghanistan. As the curator states, the exhibition serves as a reminder of the great need to have a Clothing Museum in Greece to collect and preserve all these sartorial treasures.

Jean Paul-Gaultier

It was a beautiful collection, and I did my best to photograph some of the clothes shown there. Photography is somewhat prohibited but I managed to shoot a few dresses with my mobile phone, hence the kinda crappy quality of the pictures. Let's call them artsy, ok? I loved the old, wooden closets also on display, antique luggage and various accessories especially the intriguing purses and avant-garde hats.

Marc Jacobs' silk Obama dress

Another cool thing I liked was that the exhibition is still growing and the museum is accepting donations, so in case you have a designer clutch you no longer want (seriously, what are the odds?) you can donate it to the collection for all of us to admire.

equestrian outfit (and creepy horse)

Paper dresses for advertising purposes

Andy Warhol signed paper dress

Pierre Cardin's Olympic Airways outfit

There are also two wide screens, one showing a video of a woman getting dressed in an elaborate traditional costume, kinda reminiscent of Victor and Rolf's 1999 Haute Couture "Russian Doll" collection which is also showing on a smaller tv screen. There's also a video screening of greek runway shows from past decades.

Purses

Parthenis

Sotiris Georgiou

can't remember the designer, let me know if you know him/her!

Lena Katsanidou

Aggelos Mpratis

Antria Papadopoulou

As you imagine, I got a case of serious dress envy! Sadly, touching is also prohibited which may also be a blessing in disguise as I'd probably still be there, covered in silk, lace and taffeta.

The exhibition runs until 23/05.