News / New displays at the museum
SHETLAND Museum and Archives have unveiled three new display cases featuring an 18th century waistcoat, a folding ‘scrap screen’ and a portrayal of the story of fox and mink farming in the isles.
The first display tells the story of fox and mink farming from the 1930s to the 1970s, when fur was a popular fashion accessory and Shetland contributed to the fur trade.
It includes a stole made from Zetland Silver Fox Farm pelt, and a Palamino mink stole loaned by Andrew and Davina Morrison who owned the Whiteness mink farm.
The couple also loaned a red woollen coat with white mink trim, handmade by Mrs Morrison for her six year old daughter Dianne.
The second display is a folding screen, often used in Victorian and Edwardian homes as a room divider or modesty screen. Screens were often decorated, like this one, by the popular pastime of ‘scrapping’ collected postcards, cigarette cards or other colourful and humorous images.
This screen is thought to come from the South Haa in North Roe and to have been made by Jane Burgess and her daughters, around 1910.
The final new display contains the oldest complete garment in the museum collection which can only be displayed after expert conservation.
The beautifully restored silk embroidered waistcoat belonged to William Henderson, the laird’s estate factor in Papa Stour before he died in 1799. It was donated by his great, great, great, great granddaughter, Elizabeth Morewood, from Mid Yell.
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