The European Fashion Heritage Association (EFHA) and Centraal Museum Utrecht (CMU), in collaboration with the Netherlands Institute for Sound and Vision (NISV) and the Fondazione Bruno Kessler (FBK), are working together to develop two innovative reuse scenarios in the fashion heritage domain. The primary objective is to explore and create a more engaging and immersive museum experience using historical fashion digital assets.

Marco Rendina, Managing Director of EFHA explains:

"Traditionally, the experience of a museum and its objects is rather passive. Now, we are shifting from mere observation to a more active involvement. Museums are rethinking their spaces to adapt them to the needs and requests of the public to be more involved in the creative phases of the activities of a museum, from workshops to display and exhibitions, promoting a deeper understanding of collections, a higher level of interactivity, a more diverse offer in terms of activities and ways to engage with artefacts and their stories, and a more advanced use of immersive technologies."

Cultural institutions are exploring new ways to make their collections more accessible, above all remotely. However, in most cases, this has been limited to traditional web technologies - websites, online catalogues, and social media posts - which offer little interaction and lack immersion. The pilots developed in the project aim to expand onto new digital territories by utilising 3D and augmented/virtual reality (AR/VR) technologies, bridging the gap between uncharted digital arenas and physical space of the museum and hopefully inspiring the cultural and creative sector at large.

The first scenario we envisioned addresses the challenges faced by museums in organising fashion exhibitions that involve loans from other institutions. To avoid the many complexities related to loans (fragility of historical objects, high costs of transportation and couriering, as well as issues related to prolonged display and conservation), the pilot experimented with new techniques of displaying using Social Virtual Reality. The aim is to curate an exhibition showcasing 3D costumes from fashion collections belonging to different cultural institutions. Building upon the successful MediaScape project by the Netherlands Institute for Sound & Vision (NISV is Europe's leading media museum and an EFHA member), this scenario will combine the digital and physical experience with 3D objects coming from various collections in a virtual immersive environment, and it will make them available in the Data Space for Cultural Heritage.

In June 2024, 5Dculture presented the ‘Fashion Beneath the Skin’ exhibition, with digitized garments from the archives of the Centraal Museum Utrecht (CMU), Kunstmuseum Den Haag and the Zaans Museum, supplemented with archive material from the collection of the NISV. Visitors could step into a virtual social VR exhibition and admire digitized versions of pieces that are rarely or never exhibited.

Welcomed by the colorful building of NISV, the technical team guided you into the installation. Prepared with glasses, remote controls and a short instruction, you learned how to move yourself through the three virtual spaces of the exhibition. In the first space, you as a visitor also meet your other fellow visitors. The social VR system ensures that you and your fellow visitor can experience the same virtual world. To achieve this, the Centrum Wiskunde & Informatica (CWI) has developed a special camera setup. The installation records the images of the visitor with cameras, encodes and decodes the data, and displays them so that you can see yourself and the other in real time in the virtual environment.

This project builds on the past experiences of Centraal Museum Utrecht (CMU) and the European Fashion Heritage Association (EFHA) in using 3D historical objects and augmented reality (AR) solutions to extend fashion collections beyond the museum’s physical space. As part of the “Virtual Fitting Room” pilot, a virtual try-on web application was developed in collaboration with project partner FBK, utilising Snap Lens Studio and Camera Kit. This application allows users to virtually try on garments using their smartphone or laptop cameras.

The app includes a selection of digitised historical hats from the CMU collection, which users can “wear” virtually. The AR technology automatically adjusts the size and position of each hat to fit the user’s head, creating a realistic and engaging experience. The virtual try-on app is accessible online here, enabling users to interact with historical fashion pieces from any location.

This initiative allows visitors to engage with historical objects and imagine what it would be like to wear them, while also helping the museum disseminate and add value to its digitised collections, offering a more personal and interactive experience.

The “Virtual Fitting Room” app was also showcased at CMU in the “Mode*Chapeau” exhibition, which ran from May to September 2024. In this exhibition, visitors could use a “digital mirror” to virtually wear hats on display through the app.

By pushing the boundaries of technology and incorporating these reuse scenarios, EFHA, CMU and FBK aim to demonstrate innovative ways for people to learn about, appreciate, and connect with our shared fashion heritage.

Learn more about the tool here.