Fiber Science and Apparel Design Collection Policy

OVERVIEW

subject description and guidelines

  • The Libraries seek to support research, extension, and instruction in the areas of fiber science and apparel design. The major areas of scholarship emphasize apparel design and textiles as products and processes with meaning. This multidisciplinary approach builds on materials, design, biology, chemistry, engineering and social science concepts and methods.

constituencies

  • The collection is used by faculty, staff and students of the Department of Fiber Science and Apparel Design. Other constituencies include a variety of disciplines such as Nanotechnology, Biomedical Engineering, Anthropology, History, Art, Applied Physics, Ergonomics, and Materials Science. The associated Graduate Field of Fiber Science and Apparel encompasses all aspects of fiber science and apparel design research on Cornell’s Ithaca campus.


COLLECTION SCOPE

collection strength

  • Overall, the collecting goal for Fiber Science and Apparel Design is to provide materials suitable for dissertation-level research and undergraduate, graduate and post-graduate education. The following topics are collected at this research level: fiber science; textile chemistry; apparel design; apparel/textile management; history and design of textiles; history of apparel; lace.

collection level

  • research

geographical guidelines

  • For fiber science, North America, the United Kingdom, Japan, Korea. For history of textiles and apparel or for lace, the scope is global. For history of textiles and apparel, ethnographic materials are of interest, with an emphasis on Turkey, India, Indonesia, Japan, China, Native America, and Latin America. For lace, there is an emphasis on Western Europe.

areas of significant geographic coverage

country (self-governing)

  • China 
  • India 
  • Indonesia 
  • Japan 
  • Latin America 
  • Republic of Korea 
  • Turkey 
  • United Kingdom 

transnational region

  • northern America

language guidelines

  • For fiber science, English. For history of textiles and apparel or for lace, English, French, and Italian, with Flemish added for lace.

language

  • English 
  • French 
  • Italian 

chronological guidelines

  • For fiber science, current. For history or textiles and apparel or for lace, all periods of history are included.

exclusions

  • The following areas are not collected: toy making, home crafts, quilting.

material types

  • Broadly, fiber science and apparel emphasize scholarly communication through academic and specialized journals. Scholarly, trade monographs and serials, textbooks and data sets are also collected. Exhibition catalogs for both textiles and costume are collected from major museums.


COLLECTION CONTEXT

housed in

  • Albert R. Mann Library 
  • Engineering Library 
  • Olin Library 

special collections or noteworthy resources in the field

  • Mann Library's Special Collections hold materials that are too rare, valuable or fragile to be housed in the regular stacks. An in-depth historical Lace Collection is housed in this area. ECommons serves as a repository for data files compiled by Cornell researchers.

related library subject collection


AFFILIATIONS

academic department

  • Applied and Engineering Physics (A&EP) 
  • Art (ART) 
  • Fiber Science & Apparel Design (FSAD) 
  • Materials Science and Engineering (MS&E) 
  • Textiles 
  • Theatre Arts 

graduate field/program

  • Anthropology 
  • Applied Physics 
  • Art 
  • Biomedical Engineering 
  • History 

organization

  • Anthropology (ANTHR) 
  • Biomedical Engineering (BME) 
  • History (HIST) 


RESPONSIBILITY

library contact

  • Williams, Carson - Collection Development Librarian (Mann Library)