Textile and Costume Collection

The 17,000 items in the Textile and Costume Collection are mainly from Europe, and some from overseas, representing a wide range of techniques and periods of textile art. Complementing the textiles themselves is a historical collection of equipment used to make them. The oldest items, forming a section of their own, are the Copt textiles. Also notable are the medieval priest's robes, and particularly well represented is the uniquely Hungarian form of embroidery practised in 16th and 17th century noble households, the so called úrihímzés. The most profuse section of the collection comprises examples of silk weaving from the 13th to the 19th centuries; the samples and fragments are primarily of interest to experts. In the lace section has nearly every type of sewn and bobbin lace. The tapestry collection is not large but has some unmatched pieces that attract interest from many parts of the world. The Museum also holds the world's second most important collection (after the Museum of Turkish and Islamic Art in Istanbul) of Ottoman Turkish carpets, especially the fine types known as "Transylvanian" carpets after the area where most of them have been found.