The Collection | Collection of Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum

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.

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Collection Highlights

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In white above: FREE GERONIMO PRATT/...FIGHTING SPIRIT OF THE BLACK NATION: lower right: one of the longest held political prisoners in the U.S. today...[4 lines of text]. Color photograph of a bearded man gesturing with hand at group of children playing.

Angry Graphics

Chair design in form of a growing tree or bush with crossing and intertwined veins forming seat and back. Two sketches at right of leaves intertwined and branching twigs.

From Sketch to Product

Three horizontal bands depicting scenes from the biblical story in which Judith severs Holoferne's head to save her people.

Lace from the Greenleaf Collection

Featured Objects

Landscape of brightly colored cut gems and roses on a deep blue background.2 reds, yellow, lavendar, 2 greens, 3 blues.

Flat pin in form of high-heeled shoe, toe facing left; red-glitter surface.

Amorphous figures each with two eyes facing forward, arranged in crowd format. The size of each figure varies as does the defining outline. The figures get smaller in size appearing to recede into the distance as they approach the top of the border. The unpatterned area at the border top is orange. Printed in deep orange on a white ground.

White plastic form molded in the shape of the continental United States.

Drawing, Study 142, December 5, 1957

In photographic half-tone enlargement, the head of cow in twice-life-size dimensions. Design is repeated vertically. Printed in coral and black on deep blue background.

Length of printed cotton with an acid yellow ground and an all-over trompe l'oeil pattern of golf balls and their shadows.

Irregular cartouche composed of trees, bridges, and fantastic foliage executed in the chinoiserie style. A small figure balances on a bell laden rope suspended between two platforms at center. A group of three figures watch the performance from a draped bridge at lower left.

Exhibitions on View

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Textile design consisting of cream and pink striped flowers with orange centers, along with orange and black-spotted cheetahs, against a pink background with orange spots. The cheetahs initially appear to be part of the background and are not immediately visible.

Suzie Zuzek for Lilly Pulitzer: The Prints That Made the Fashion Brand

A house in middle surrounded by symmetrically arranged flower and topiary beds. A densely planted border of trees surrounds on three sides. Entrance to garden at center bottom edge of drawing.

The Modernist French Garden: Design by the Vera Brothers

Willi Smith: Street Couture

Contemporary Muslim Fashions

Silk embroidery in pale colors on dark blue linen. A horizontally and vertically symmetrical floral pattern in the Morris style.

Botanical Expressions

Nature by Design: Cochineal

Large tortoiseshell comb with pierced stylized flower and vine motifs.

Plastics

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