Welcome to our collection!

Explore over 30 centuries of design online, from ancient Roman marble to Pre-Columbian textiles, Renaissance drawings, contemporary 3D-printed chairs, and digital code. Please note that cataloging a collection of over 215,000 objects is a work in progress. You may come across records with very little information, factual errors, or harmful language. We appreciate your help in addressing these concerns and invite your feedback.

Example Searches: Chair Poster Fork Sidewall Matchsafe Sampler

Collection Highlights

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Circular form; against an orange background figure of a man with hammer in one hand (raised) and a sword in other; white band around border.

Soviet Porcelains from the Shapiro Collection
Elevation of west wall, with the two large wall paintings of bamboo trees and pagodas flanking the fireplace. The wall panels are flanked by paintings of Chinese columns entwined by serpents. The coved section is shown above on separate piece of paper, with three lozenge-shaped painted glass panels. Alternative design painted underneath.

Brighton Pavilion: King George IV's Pleasure Palace
White ribbed silk semi-circular purse with drawstring top, embroidered with polychrome silks in floral designs and edged in silver bobbin lace. Lined with blue taffeta; braded green silk cord at top.

Purses, Pouches, Pockets

Featured Objects

Exhibitions on View

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Zero-waste scrub patterns with an open source design to be easily printed at home and modified by healthcare workers.

Design and Healing: Creative Responses to Epidemics

Underground Modernist: E. McKnight Kauffer
Black flag with alternating squares of red and white forming a border. Flag depicts an all-female militia confronting a male intruder who reacts with fear to their presence. The two women closest to the intruder carry a flag and a drum while the others carry rifles and a machete. A small British flag appears in the upper left hand corner. The initials of the militia are embroidered along the bottom edge. The flag is fringed on three sides.

Jon Gray of Ghetto Gastro Selects
Silk embroidery in pale colors on dark blue linen. A horizontally and vertically symmetrical floral pattern in the Morris style.

Botanical Expressions
Anatomical model of Theobroma Cacao glued to a vertical rod mounted on a stepped base with affixed paper label

Botanical Lessons

Collections in Motion

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Arc Touch Mouse: Production Process

The Arc Touch Mouse was designed to be portable, comfortable, and sleek.

Curatorial Departments

Horizontal rectangle showing an interior view. At right, two stools, one red and one blue, stand before a bar with a yellow foot rail. Behind are three floating shelves with bottles. At left, a blue banquette stands behind a row of tables with rectilinear decoration in black, white orange and yellow. The walls are white with horizontal detailing. There is a white dropped ceiling with round colored lights.

Drawings, Prints, and Graphic Design
Grey-glazed gourd-like form (a), having bulbous lower section tapering up to a curved neck; the rounded top with four holes set off-center; cork stopper (b) in underside.

Product Design and Decorative Arts
Gentleman's waistcoat with standing collar, straight hem edge and pocket welts, with ten worked buttonholes and covered buttons, lined with twill. Embroidered in twenty-five colors of silk floss and chenille on an ivory silk taffeta ground. Overall small floral sprig, with a deep border of irises and other flowers down center front and across bottom. On the larger flowers at the bottom, caterpillars are embroidered in various shades of chenille.

Textiles
Scenes of black lambs in a dressing room or sitting on chairs in between bouquets of flowers, pink perfume bottles, and lipstick cases on a metallic silver ground.

Wallcoverings