Amherst Historical Society rents costumes to fund museum

AMHERST — For those who never get too old to play dress up, the Amherst Historical Society has a deal for you. The society has been renting out costumes from its collections for the past year as a quiet sideline as it prepare its archives for the launch of its new installation, the Textile Museum Center, this spring. Board member and longtime volunteer Linda Cosma has been organizing the group's vast amounts of clothes, hats and accessories to move them from their former storage space in the upstairs of the Quigley Museum on the grounds of the Amherst Sandstone Village into its new home in the Pine Tree building. The museum will be an interactive space where crafters and visitors can come and learn and teach each other how to loom, weave, hand-sew, knit, crotchet or all sorts of lost arts that were once common practical or artistic skills. "I love it, I love what we do," Cosma said. "You know when you're a little girl and you play house? We're making costumes and we're going back in history and remaking the DNA, relearning the crafts of our ancestors." As the group works to move in an early 1800s working loom and other artifacts, it has already opened to the public one aspect of its series: costume rentals. Through the years it has acquired a sizable closet of items, some costumes but also many real vintage pieces spanning a broad time range, Cosma said. Items came from a number of sources, including private donors, downsizing theater companies, and unusual sources, like a retiring magician. "You can't have enough magic hats," she said. Before the AHS ever put the word out about costume rentals, a small private school called last March to inquire if they could help find costumes for an upcoming production of "Anne of Green Gables." It was the Textile Department's first job. "All the kids were just thrilled. They were putting the Edwardian dresses on and we were giving them pointers, that the women didn't go out without their hats and gloves, giving them advice on the historical times," Cosma, who has a history degree from Baldwin Wallace University, said. "She has spent untold hours making sure this is an accessible and usable opportunity for the community," said Elizabeth Fought, AHS director of community engagement. The service fills a need in the community as other costume shops have closed in recent years, or are cost-prohibitive. Rentals are priced reasonably at $10 to $15 for an entire set of clothing and accessories, meant to help the organization purchase more archival storage materials and acid-free tissue paper and boxes for its goods. The project also has benefited from the aid of Jack Lawrence and Noah Belles of AmeriCorps' Ohio History Service Corps, which has been working with the AHS to preserve and exhibit its textile and military collections. "We studied all our lives for this sort of thing. Are we passionate? Yes. Are we experts? No. It's just something we're driven to do," Cosma said. Cosma said there are more than 150 costumes from many different eras, from the renaissance to the Victorian era, the Revolutionary War to the 1920s through the 1950s. "We have fantasy stuff, some medieval stuff, a lot of capes for a Halloween walk, and Krampus," she said. "We have prom dresses in case we wanted to do 'Carrie The Musical.' You know, we've got a weird sense of humor." Don't come looking for superheroes, though. "They're not Wonder Woman or The Flash. These are historical costumes," she said. "These are cotton, they're well taken care of, there is jewelry to go with it. Lots of hats, lots of wigs." To set an appointment to rent a costume, call the AHS at (440) 988-7255 or email office@amhersthistorialsociety.org. Contact Rini Jeffers at rinijeffers@gmail.com.