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Join us for an exclusive member preview of “Fabric of America: Our Fashions, Textiles, and Technologies,” a limited-time exhibition at Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation. Drawing exclusively from The Henry Ford's collections, this exhibition explores the deep connections between textiles and our shared history. Through five enduring American values — liberty, practicality, inventiveness, abundance and individualism — this exhibition reveals how fabric shapes who we are as a people and a nation, part of The Henry Ford's “America: 250 Years in the Making” commemoration.
Presenting a rare opportunity to see over 500 artifacts from our permanent textile collection, “Fabric of America” is divided into five key themes:
👖 LIBERTY | Justice · Freedom · Equality · Empowerment
Artifact Highlights: Household items carried by the Adler family as they fled Nazi Germany illustrate the power of textiles to hold memory, hope and heritage. Intimate objects like tablecloths, doilies and decorative shelf liners introduce a story of refuge and reinvention — one that continues through Ruth Adler Schnee's entrepreneurial textile and design career.
👕 PRACTICALITY | Informality · Utility · Functionality
Artifact Highlights: Feed and food sacks repurposed into dresses, aprons and bedding, along with examples of durable workwear, explore the resourcefulness and creativity found in the story of practicality.
👖 INVENTIVENESS | Ambition · Creativity · Innovation
Artifact Highlights: Garments by designers such as Bonnie Cashin, Halston and Ralph Lauren demonstrate the creativity that defines American fashion. Their work appears alongside innovations in textile production, highlighting how new ideas continually transform what we wear.
👕 ABUNDANCE | Affordability · Materialism · Replication · Speed · Novelty
Artifact Highlights: Power looms, fabric samples and factory-made garments show how mechanized weaving and clothing construction fueled a new era of mass production and affordability — profoundly changing the way we worked and lived. Contemporary fast-fashion garments extend the story to the present and prompt reflection on abundance and its environmental impact.
👖 INDIVIDUALISM | Autonomy · Theatrics · Identity
Artifact Highlights: Bold silhouettes like the zoot suit — with its oversized shoulders, wide lapels and tapered trousers — were embraced by Black and Mexican American communities as expressions of pride and presence, demonstrating how clothing communicates identity.
Together, these stories present a retrospective of the ways clothing and textiles have conveyed identity, ambition and possibility across American history. From practical workwear to haute couture, understated household items to exuberant fashion statements, displayed artifacts highlight both the overlooked and the celebrated. Machinery, raw materials and the tools of textile production round out this narrative, revealing the full lifecycle of fabric and the many forces that shape it.
For 250 years, Americans have expressed shifting identities through textiles, clothing and fashion, even as core values have endured. “Fabric of America” shows how these artifacts capture the country's history and the diverse experiences of its people, offering a compelling look at how fabric continues to reflect and define us.
➡️ “Fabric of America” will be open through September 13 in The Gallery by General Motors at Henry Ford Museum of American Innovation. This exhibition is free for members or included with museum admission. Learn more at THF.org/fabric.
➡️ Become a member of The Henry Ford for exclusive access to member previews, plus 12 months of general admission to the museum and Greenfield Village, free parking and exclusive savings starting the day you join. Learn more at THF.org/membership.
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Event Venue
The Henry Ford, Gift Shop, Dearborn, MI 48124, United States
Tickets
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