Cookie banner

This site uses cookies. Select "Block all non-essential cookies" to only allow cookies necessary to display content and enable core site features. Select "Accept all cookies" to also personalize your experience on the site with ads and partner content tailored to your interests, and to allow us to measure the effectiveness of our service.

To learn more, review our Cookie Policy, Privacy Notice and Terms of Use.

or
clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile

Filed under:

Iris Apfel Elects To Donate 600 Pieces of her Famous Wardrobe To Massachusetts Museum Over the Met

Racked is no longer publishing. Thank you to everyone who read our work over the years. The archives will remain available here; for new stories, head over to Vox.com, where our staff is covering consumer culture for The Goods by Vox. You can also see what we’re up to by signing up here.


We're accepting donations, Iris. Image via Getty

Five decades of serious shopping can lead to many things: waning closet space, some a hell of a lot of unjustly forgotten pieces, and a wardrobe that chronicles half a century. We imagine it's these reasons, plus her general awesomeness, that have led Iris Apfel to offer more than 600 pieces from her wardrobe to Peabody Essex Museum in Salem, Massachusetts—a donation the museum has graciously accepted.

The 600 articles, garments from the likes of Karl Lagerfeld, Lanvin, Halston, Christian Dior, and Alexander McQueen, among others, were previously featured in the “Rare Bird of Fashion: The Irreverent Iris Apfel’’ exhibit, which was curated and debuted at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art in 2005 before making the rounds on the museum circuit. After the show went to the Peabody Essex, Apfel became enamored with the small but forward-thinking museum, hence her decision to donate to them over the Met. We are scheduling our field trip to Salem immediately, and will spend the ride up there speculating on what will fill her newly reclaimed closet space.
· Fashion Icon to Bequeath Trove To Salem Museum [Boston Globe]
· Iris Apfel For Schiaparelli? Why Not [Racked]
· All Iris Apfel Coverage [Racked]