Exhibition curator and Deputy Surveyor of The King's Pictures Anna Reynolds is joined by head of The School of Historical Dress Jenny Tiramani and Kathleen McKee, lecturer of the BA(Hons) Costume for Theatre and Screen course at Wimbledon College of Arts. In this exciting evening event, our panel of experts will explore the differences between historical, Georgian dress and the exceptional recreations of historical costumes for stage and screen made today. Panellists will discuss the designer's approach when recreating ‘authentic’ costumes and what adaptations have to be made to suit modern-day usage, as well as the role of sustainability in costume design and how this compares to the use of fabric in the 18th Century.

Doors will open at 18:30, with the panel discussion commencing at 19:00 followed by an opportunity for guests to view the exhibition until the gallery closes at 21:00. Your ticket will also include a glass of wine or soft drink to enjoy while you explore the exhibition.

To give a flavour of the fabulous items of dress that will be discussed during this event, the below images show some exceptional examples of costume wear created by current and past students at the Wimbledon College of Arts.

The first set of images show a contemporary re-imagining of a period costume by Caroline Husband who graduated last year and was of winner of Patterns for Performance 2022. The costume has both Regency and 18th century influence and was made all in white for projection mapping.

The second and third garments depicted were created by third year students Leonor Ferreira De Almeida (1820s white dress) and Sassie Shelton (1780s green striped dress). Both entered the Patterns of Fashion competition this year for which the winner has not yet been announced. This competition requires accurate reproductions from the Patterns of Fashion books, made using historically accurate methods of construction, so these two examples were entirely made by hand as the sewing machine was invented at a later time.