Museum of the History of Greek Costume in the Lyceum Club of Greek Women

The Museum of the History of Greek Costume was opened in 1988 with the support of the Minister of Culture Melina Mercouri. The museum became part of the Lyceum Club of Greek Women, a non-profit organization that has been operating since 1910. The museum is housed in a two-storey building built by architect Elias Econom in the 1920s, which in 1985 became the property of the Club.

The beginning of the museum collection was laid by dance costumes and accessories, stored in the Club since the 1920s. The caretaker of the costume collection, Alexander Wassenhofen, who worked in the club for 37 years, proposed to make museum exhibits costumes that were no longer suitable for performance on stage due to their age, but due to the rich finish and accuracy of details could be useful in studying the history of Greek culture. This is how the idea of creating a museum came about.

Today, the museum’s collection includes more than 250,000 pieces of costumes and accessories. Mostly these are detailed recreated folk costumes of different regions of Greece. This includes Greek national costumes, jewelry, copies of Minoan, classical and Byzantine costumes, miniature dolls in folk costumes. Only part of the collection is exhibited in various thematic exhibitions held on the ground floor. Since 1990, the museum has produced thematic calendars for each exhibition.