Conversations on Dress: Digitizing, Databasing, and Diversity in Collections Management
Wednesday, April 16, 2025
7:00 pm Eastern/4:00 pm Pacific
FREE Webinar, Open to All

Management for historic dress collections is increasingly strategizing around the digital capacities for record keeping and user engagement. However, most professionals in CSA have had limited background or ongoing training in keeping up with technological advancements and public expectations as we open our vaults for online searching and create exhibitions with robust web presence. This panel will feature a discussion with four professionals who have focused on the digital and databasing world in collections management, considering how we document, catalog, represent, and give online access to diverse objects in our collections.

Topics will include the complexities of AI and OCR as tools, controlled vocabularies and varied naming conventions, international, subcultural, and niche object representation, best practices in photography, funding, and staffing, and user experiences with discoverability and searchability of our collections. The panelists' careers range from university museums to high fashion collections to subcultural bands to private international archives, with the respective goals and audiences for each of those missions.

Click here to register
Registration closes 24 hours prior to the event.
If you missed the deadline, email conversationsondress@costumesocietyamerica.com.

Images (left to right): Arden Kirkland, Clare Sauro, Dina Smith-Glaviana, Monica Sklar