Design Museum & Design Collection // COLLECTION

Collection

The mission of the Design Collection is to support and enhance the teaching and research goals of the Design Program at the University of California at Davis. As a special study resource for both design faculty and students majoring in Fashion and Textile, Visual Communication and Exhibition, Interior Architecture and Furniture, and Lighting Design, the objects are frequently used for hands-on studies in the classroom and museum installations. They serve to illustrate technical and stylistic design concepts, and document the evolution of media and cultural understanding.

With more than 40 years of collecting and preserving historic design-related artifacts, the Collection currently houses over 5,000 items ranging from the 16th Century to the present. Built from donations by members of the community, faculty, and alumni, the objects represent a broad diversity of geography, eras, and cultures. While the majority of holdings include textile and costume, basketry, and porcelain items, a number of examples of furniture pieces and architectural drawings have also been acquired. Many items from the Design Collection have been featured in books, periodicals, and exhibitions at venues nationwide, including the California Crafts Museum, San Francisco International Airport Museums, the Los Angeles Theater Center, the Pence Gallery of Davis, the Sacramento Public Library, the New Jersey State Museum, and on the home page of the Costume Society of America's website. The UC Davis Design Museum, a place dedicated to furthering the understanding of design and the contributions that design makes to shape our experience, environment, and culture, has mounted several major exhibitions of the Collection since 1982.

Today, the Design Collection continues to play an active and unique role at the UC Davis across its educational and outreach missions, and searches for more public support and donations with a variety of both important historic artifacts and new innovative designs that can represent recent technological developments to enrich the collection, inspire the curricula, and stimulate research about the creation of our environment.