The university of connecticut's institutional insights and innovation team will design, build, and launch a digital archive of over 20,000 american fashion illustrations of clothing from 1790 to 1930

The Institute of Museum and Library Services awarded the University of Connecticut $272,910 on September 1, 2026, under the National Leadership Grants program (CFDA 45.312) to design, build, and launch a digital archive of over 20,000 American fashion illustrations spanning 1790 to 1930.

The University of Connecticut's Institutional Insights and Innovation Team will digitize fashion plates and structure the underlying database to accommodate future additions of photographs, paintings, and images of surviving garments. Project staff will create educational guides to help users recognize identifying features of clothing, enabling them to date unidentified garments and interpret portraits. The resulting website will organize materials by garment type and feature a new online tool allowing users to sort and filter collection materials by visual criteria. The resource will serve museum staff and public researchers seeking to date, identify, and contextualize American historical clothing.

Performance takes place in Storrs, Connecticut, with a period of performance from September 1, 2026, through August 31, 2028. The award is classified as a Project Grant. The National Leadership Grants program supports projects addressing critical needs of the museum and library fields with potential to advance professional practice and generate results such as models, tools, research findings, services, or practices that can be widely used, adapted, scaled, or replicated.

While the underlying database will initially be stocked with fashion plates, its structure will permit adding photographs, paintings, and images of surviving garments. Project staff will create guides to educate users about how to recognize identifying features of clothing to date unidentified garments and portraits. Organized by garment type, the resulting website will feature the digitized archive as well as a new online tool that allows users to sort and filter collection materials by visual criteria. The online resource will help museum staff and public researchers to date and identify american clothing as well as interpret the cultural significance of historical clothing for public audiences.