Damage sustained by museum collections often brings a silver lining. Such was certainly the case with a wool floral dressing gown, dating from about 1860 and worn by Hannah Hodges Hunt of Augusta, that suffered water staining during a drainage system failure in Maine State Museum collections storage some years ago.
Enter the conservators at Museum Textile Services in North Andover, Massachusetts who examined the dressing gown (also known as a robe de chambre) and determined that it could be restored through careful, wet cleaning. The cleaning and drying process gave the conservators, and an intern working there, an excellent opportunity to bring focused study to the dressing gown. What they discovered was a rare casual dress of a large size that is seldom represented in museum collections.
