Oxford, 2nd June 2010, for immediate release

The Metropolitan Museum of Art signs partnership agreement with Berg
Publishers

Berg Publishers, the leading specialist academic and reference imprint
owned by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, is delighted to announce a new
partnership with the Metropolitan Museum of Art to enable more than two
thousand images from the internationally renowned Costume Institute's
collection to be made available through the Berg Fashion Library, a new
online resource launching in late June 2010.

The Berg Fashion Library is an innovative new online portal that will
enable users to locate images as well as reference and research
materials on the subject of costume and dress. A core value of the Berg
Fashion Library is to increase the accessibility of fashion objects held
in disparate collections across the world through sophisticated search
and browse. Berg's classification system will make it easier for
students, scholars and curators to see clothing and related objects that
they otherwise might not know existed, and to link to relevant content
providing historical and cultural context. Thumbnail images from the
Met's collection will be displayed within the Berg Fashion Library, and
users will be able to click through to the Costume Institute's website
for further information.   
 
Harold Koda, Curator-in-Charge of the Costume Institute, comments:
"We are delighted to announce this partnership with Berg, as it will
make images from the Costume Institute available to new audiences
throughout the world. The Berg Fashion Library should bring more
students to our site and help curators who are searching for exhibition
objects. We are looking forward to the launch and to participating in
this exciting new project."

Kathryn Earle, Managing Director of Berg Publishers, says:
"We could not be happier to be announcing this important relationship.
It will enable students, researchers and curators throughout the world
to learn more about and experience the dress objects featured in this
glorious collection. The Met, even before the addition of the Brooklyn
Museum's impressive collection, has long been at the forefront of
international fashion collections. Many of our users will never have the
opportunity to see the Met's holdings in person, but they can at least
get a sense of the importance of the collection from their desktops, and
learn more about the history and culture of the full range of featured
dress from the Berg Fashion Library's reference content."

ENDS

Notes for Editors

For further information, please contact Jennifer Howell at Berg
Publishers:
email: [log in to unmask] 
telephone: 01865 245104

Visuals are available from [log in to unmask]

About the Berg Fashion Library
Launching in late June 2010, the Berg Fashion Library will be the first
online portal to offer comprehensive coverage of dress and fashion
around the world by providing access to interdisciplinary and integrated
image, book and journal content.

Informed by prestigious academic and library advisors, the Berg Fashion
Library will offer cross-searchable access to an expanding range of
content collections (for example the new 10-volume Berg Encyclopedia of
World Dress and Fashion) and images from internationally-renowned
collections at the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Victoria & Albert
Museum. All content will be underpinned by a specially created and
highly detailed taxonomy to enhance search and browse.  

The Berg Fashion Library will be available through Oxford University
Press by annual subscription. For further information, please visit
www.bergfashionlibrary.com
<http://www.bergpublishers.com/bdlink.aspx?id=346817&link=http%3a%2f%2fw
ww.bergfashionlibrary.com> .

About Berg Publishers
Established in 1982, and acquired by Bloomsbury Publishing Plc in
September 2008, Berg is the leading international publisher of academic
books, reference works, and journals on world dress and fashion, a
fast-growing and interdisciplinary area of study at universities and
colleges worldwide. 

Berg publishes approximately 50 new books each year, and over 100 titles
in fashion theory and practice are already available. Berg also
publishes 16 academic journals on culture and the visual arts including
the market leading Fashion Theory, the award-winning Textile: The
Journal of Cloth & Culture, and the recently launched Fashion Practice.
See www.bergjournals.com
<http://www.bergpublishers.com/bdlink.aspx?id=346817&link=http%3a%2f%2fw
ww.bergjournals.com>  for further details.

In 2008, Berg won the Independent Publishers Award for E-Publishing in
recognition of its achievements and plans for online publishing. The
company was acquired by Bloomsbury Publishing PLC in September 2008.

For more information about Berg Publishers, please visit
www.bergpublishers.com
<http://www.bergpublishers.com/bdlink.aspx?id=346817&link=http%3a%2f%2fw
ww.bergpublishers.com> .

About the Metropolitan Museum of Art
The Metropolitan Museum of Art is one of the world's largest and finest
art museums. Its collections include more than two million works of art
spanning five thousand years of world culture, from prehistory to the
present and from every part of the globe. 

Founded in 1937, The Museum of Costume Art, after its incorporation and
renaming as The Costume Institute, became a part of the Metropolitan
Museum in 1946. Currently it contains a collection of more than 35,000
pieces dating from the 17th century to the present, including
fashionable dress and regional costumes from Europe, Asia, Africa, and
the Americas. The Costume Institute organizes exhibitions each year,
which receive international recognition. Involved in art-historical
research since its founding, The Costume Institute contributes to
scholarship through a range of publications. 

In December 2008, the Brooklyn Museum's costume collection (founded in
1902) was transferred to the Met. The stature and quality of the
Brooklyn collection inspired a number of great American designers to
deposit their archives at the Museum. In addition to being an
outstanding assemblage of individual works of great rarity and aesthetic
quality, with masterpieces by Worth, Paul Poiret, Lanvin, Christian
Dior, Balenciaga, Charles James, Norman Norell, and Claire McCardell,
the collection documents the consolidation and growing international
importance of the fashion industry in New York City.

Jennifer Howell
Berg Fashion Library
Email: [log in to unmask]
<mailto:[log in to unmask]> 

Berg Publishers
1st Floor, Angel Court
81 St Clements Street
Oxford OX4 1AW, UK
Tel: +44 (0) 1865-245104 


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