Come and engage with how we do our mahi (work), and to experience it first hand and in a real space. We are taking this as an opportunity to share the decolonising kaupapa (principles) of our museum model with a local audience and the international assembly. Our primary source for all content is the community; this makes for a collaborative and multi-vocal museum model, bringing together objects and knowledge held by individuals and by working with institutions like libraries, universities, and museums to share their collections, archives, and spaces.

You are invited to join the New Zealand Fashion Museum on Saturday 12 October 2024 as it occupies a physical space at the Auckland Central Library. Join some of our regular online audience as we gather for a day of hands-on activities that take you behind our online presence and mahi. The day offers first hand experience of the museum’s exhibition making, opportunities to engage with our kaupapa and participatory workshops that cover archival researching, collection preparation, documenting, building relationships with our clothing and above all, storytelling.

Attendance is free, and we look forward to hosting a day of activities and experiences which share our processes and values with you all, as our contribution to the vast array of GFA24 events happening in person and online around the world.

Event activities

Popup photography session with Denise Baynham

Join us as we bring our garment documentation process out of the photo studio and into the Research Central space on Level 2 of the Auckland Central City Library, with photographer Denise Baynham. We will chat to her about what she looks for, pays attention to, and considers when shooting garments to show them off in their best light. 

We invite people to bring garments to share with us and be photographed on the day, however advance notice is required. Have something you would like to share? email some images and garment details to Doris de Pont at doris@nzfashionmuseum.org before Friday 11 October.

On the day we will also interview a garment contributor about their garment - history, why they have kept it, where it was worn, ‘value’ et al, original use and original photographs as well, to share a more in-depth look at how we collect and share not only the physical aspects of collection garments, but also the social and personal provenance attached to their item.

When Clothes Become our Friends - Workshop series

When Clothes Become Our Friends is a curated journey for wearer participants. An adventure through 4 stages led by Jennifer Whitty and Karishma Singh Kelsey.

Provocation: Imagine a world where we understood how deeply life is lived in clothes. If we accept our clothes as friends, who enrich our lives, how would it change our behaviour with our clothes? How would we speak to them, & care for them? What kind of compliments would we give each other if our clothes had feelings and could hear us? We simply ask for you to join us, in your clothed body, with an open mind, heart, and spirit.

Hopes and Aspirations: These series of actions aim to help us profoundly rethink and recalibrate our relationship to fashion, at a time when the logic of the linear, industrial system is failing us all on a monumental scale - limiting our ability to feel, think and be with our clothes. We hope to build practices based on joy, and care to enable us to use new words, create new stories and forge new relationships with and through our clothing.

Stage 1: Wearers sign up at the Library entrance at any time for a personalized Clothing-Friendship Programme with the Clothing Support Workers . This will take the form of an interactive clothing/treasure- hunt across the library. Wearers will be assigned a particular role and will be given a menu of options to guide their experience. They will be asked to act, do, find and interact with other wearers in the library, to document their key insights as part of their transformative journey of unlearning, relearning, and becoming friends with clothes. Clothing Support Workers will guide and support workers throughout the library and capture key insights to share in the Event Space. 

Stage 2: Listen to the Clothes Speak: Unlearning, Relearning, and Becoming Through Clothing. A follow up series of speculative fun, imaginative activities that will amplify and deepen the work begun as part of the Clothing-Friendship Programme as we continue to explore the wisdom of the clothing that lies quietly on our bodies . We will collectively share insights from the interactive clothing/treasure- hunt. In teams, participants will be given prompts and tools, to create speculative scenarios to forge new relationships across the human-non-human world. Aim: We will create a tapestry of new language, vocabulary & tools to share that will deepen our relationship with our clothing friends.

Stage 3: Karishma Singh Kelsey guides you towards reconnection and remembering through the meditative art of dressing as a form of conscious creative expression to self. How to Prepare for the Workshop Easy! Bring those favourite pieces that need a refresh, that bold item you’ve been too shy to wear, or something you wish you loved but don’t—yet!, clothes you have always hoped you could wear but have shied away from. Come dressed as your most creative self and bring a journal and pen. The Journey Begins (30 minutes): Introduction to Style Activism and the Miraculous Me Manifesto, Ancestral acknowledgments, and grounding meditation, connecting us to our clothes. Phase 2 Colours of the Soul (30 minutes): Interactive exploration. Colour as a superpower. Phase 2.3: Your Body as Your Canvas (30 minutes) Give yourself permission to embrace your unique style. Focus on creativity as a birthright and personal style as a medium for authentic self-expression, driven by intuition and spirit.

Stage 4: A celebration of the magic of clothing and the joy to be discovered in mind-body-clothing. Anyone can participate in this exciting event and showcase how you have chosen 'to fashion' yourself. Register with a Clothing Support Workers at the Library entrance at anytime prior to 2:30 PM.

You can join us for all 4 of these stages or join any stage independently.

Research Workshop with Auckland Libraries Staff

The New Zealand Fashion Museum prides itself on delivering interesting, informative, and factually accurate stories. In this workshop, you will learn how you can make use of the Auckland Libraries archival and pictorial collections while researching and writing a story for the NZ Fashion Museum. Join librarians Anna Varghese and Brent Giblin who will share how to access, search, use, and credit some of these wonderful resources. They will then invite you to apply this knowledge in a practical way to begin a fashion story draft for the Fashion Museum.

This is a 90 minute workshop, please bring your own laptop.

Numbers are limited to 15 participants so booking is essential, secure your place by heading to Eventbrite here.

Not only will we be hosting an in-person event on the 12th of October, but we will also be sharing the happenings of the day with the global GFA24 community on the 19th of October, 7-10pm NZST. Attendance is free, and you can register by following the link to the right. 

This event is supported by Auckland Council and the city centre targeted rate.

For more information about the Global Fashioning Assembly, and the other events that this global symposium is comprised of, head to the Eventbrite link listed to the right.

The Global Fashioning  A celebration of the magic of clothing and the joy to be discovered in mind-body-clothing. Anyone can participate in this exciting event and showcase how you have chosen 'to fashion' yourself. Register with a Clothing Support Workers at the Library entrance at anytime prior to 2:30 PM. (GFA) is a biennial online gathering of local fashion coalitions from around the world to decenter and decolonise knowledge creation and sharing on body fashioning practices and heritages.

GFA was initiated in 2021 by the Research Collective on Decoloniality & Fashion (RCDF), a not-for-profit organisation registered in the Netherlands.