Costume storage and cataloguing

[RumbleO]

The wardrobe mistress at a local dance school has asked for assistance to refit the wardrobe store, and catalogue the costumes. The dance school is in a council building (I suspect it used to be a cottage hospital. The electrical distribution board labels circuits to "Mortuary", "New Lab",)

 

The costume store has been the attic for ten years, with the costumes on shelves, in bags, and on collapsing Argos hanging racks.

 

The costumes have survived well - no damp, not too crushed, but not easy to find.

 

What do the members suggest? When I was with Scottish Ballet, everything was in wicker hampers, but there was warehouse sized storage.

 

The hire shops seem to use long racks, but their turnoaround is more frequent than we would be using costumes.

 

I wondered about curtain poles end to end in the room.

 

Any suggestions gratefully received.

 

Thanks

[w/robe]

You need to know how you will want to find the costumes.

 

If you want to look for individual items then they will require hanging so that you can look through them.

If you are going to use them as 'show sets' (like Scottish Ballet) they can be stored in skips as you will want the whole skip full at once. It is impossible to find individual costumes in a mixed skip.

 

For hanging most large stores use 'Galvanized Steel Tube & Tubeclamps' from Key Industrial (www.keyind.co.uk) you will want the 26.9mm outside diameter (type A) tube to take coat hangers. It can be bought as individual components to suit your needs. It is not cheap but will never collapse.

 

It is probably not worth actually cataloging the entire stock, just organise it in a logical way so that all similar items are together,

 

1 By period - 1920's 1930's etc.

 

2 By type and size - trousers waist 30'', trousers waist 32''

 

3 By the age they fit, if you have childrens costumes.

 

4 By production - Oklahoma frocks

 

5 One off pieces - those strange mermaid costumes we made for that show once.

 

Most stores use a combination of all the above.

 

Remember any system only works if it is maintained. The easiest way to insure this is by limiting access so that only people accompanied by a member of wardrobe staff have access to the store. If something is put back in the wrong place it could be lost for a long time.