How to store your clothes properly according to a fashion archivist

Shonagh Marshall setting up the Isabella Blow exhibition at Somerset House

The changing of the seasons signals the time to rotate our autumn/winter and spring/summer wardrobes, often placing one of those two halves into storage (especially for those living in small spaces and/or fashion hoarders). This seemingly overwhelming task requires some thought and consideration, after all, who wants to unearth their favourite cashmere sweaters in six months to find them moth-eaten, or discover a beautiful silk dress is water stained and irrevocably creased? As a fashion curator and archivist, I have spent years dedicated to cataloguing and storing the priceless collections of Alexander McQueen, Christian Louboutin and, perhaps the most challenging yet rewarding of all, Isabella Blow.

Comprising some 1,000 objects, Isabella Blow’s extraordinary collection, much like the most ordinary of wardrobes, bore all the marks of a life lived. The lace overlay on the train of an Alexander McQueen cropped frock coat, from his AW96 collection, had been ripped – you can just imagine Blow pulling it from the clutches of a taxi door, or yanking it from the spike of someone’s stiletto at a party. When it came to curating these one-of-a-kind looks for the 2013/14 exhibition Isabella Blow: Fashion Galore! at London’s Somerset House, I decided to conserve rather than cover up these signs of wear and tear, because they tell stories. It is the power of clothes as a storytelling mechanism that fascinates me most about fashion. With that particular tear in the McQueen coat, I called upon the expertise of textile conservator Elizabeth Rose, who used underlying gauze to protect Blow’s imprint, while ensuring it wouldn’t get any larger.

There is something to learn from this approach when looking to our own wardrobe maintenance; our most treasured items of clothing are often so because they are imbued with memories. Clothes should be worn and most importantly enjoyed, but we also want them to last as long as possible, and one way of ensuring longevity is to store them correctly. Here are my five key pieces of advice for preserving your favourite fashion.

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