Marjorie Jonas
Education
BA, State University of New York College at Fredonia
MA, Fashion Institute of Technology, State University of New York
Biography
Marjorie Jonas, an expert fashion conservator, is proud to share her skills and experience in this field with a new generation as an adjunct instructor at FIT’s Fashion and Textile Studies: History, Theory, Museum Practice program.
Before retiring in the summer of 2020, Jonas was an assistant conservator at The Museum at FIT for ten years, where she worked on more than 40 exhibitions. Her responsibilities at MFIT included dressing and mounting many of the historic garments, textiles, and accessories for photography and exhibition; therefore, she is perfectly suited to her new role: teaching the costume mounting portion of the Fashion and Textile Mounting Skills class.
In addition to her academic career, Jonas continues to work on specialty conservation projects with other museums and private clients. A past project she is particularly fond of recalling was that of conserving and making reproductions of costumes for automata in the Guinness Collection at the Morris Museum in Morristown, NJ. She is currently mounting textiles for an exhibit at El Museo del Barrio: "Something Beautiful: Reframing la Colección."
Not content solely with preserving the creations of other designers, Jonas owned and operated a custom dressmaking and tailoring business, Marjorie’s Needle, for more than 30 years. By focusing on creating garments specifically made for individuals who were hard to fit, Jonas acquired unique skills and experience dealing with the intricacies of finely-crafted couture, skills she then transferred into her work as a professional conservator. Marjorie’s Needle also gained a reputation as a visionary maker of contemporary wedding gowns. Prior to opening her own boutique, Jonas was a second, dressmaker, and shopper for Barbara Matera’s costume shop in New York City for five years, creating costumes for theater productions, Broadway shows, the American Ballet Theater Company, and many other groups.
Jonas received her Master of Arts degree in Fashion and Textile Studies: History, Theory, Museum Practice program at FIT. She is very excited to begin a new phase in her life-long career relationship with her alma mater. She has retained strong ties with her teachers and mentors at FIT and is honored to now be in a position to return the kindness once shown to her by helping to form and mentor the next era of FIT’s fashion conservators.
Research Interests
Dress and textile history. Mounting fashion, costume and textiles for exhibition and photography. Reading historical fiction especially with references to dress.
Selected Publications
“Can Movement be a Conservation Goal? Preserving the Essence of Automata on the Murtoch D. Guinness Collection” , co-authors Kathy Francis and Jere Ryder Pre-Prints and Conference for the North American Textile Conservation Conference, at FIT, Nov. 2015.
“Finding Aid for the Bonnie Cashin Sketches” June 2010, SPARC, Gladys Marcus Library at FIT
“A Futurist’s Past, Today’s Publication Technology, Tomorrow’s Researchers: Preparing Bonnie Cashin Sketches for Access” Developing a finding aid and preservation protocols for Bonnie Cashin design sketches June 2010, in SPARC, Gladys Marcus Library at FIT
Conferences and Presentations
Presentation of two conservation treatments of a MFIT collection Poiret velvet cape and an automaton from the Guinness Collection in the Morris Museum in Morristown, NJ. for an Advanced Conservation class in the FIT Graduate studies program-Fashion and Textile Studies: History Theory and Practice (via Google Meets), Nov. 2020
“Can Movement be a Conservation Goal? Preserving the Essence of Automata on the Murtoch D. Guinness Collection” , co-authors Kathy Francis and Jere Ryder Pre-Prints and Conference for the North American Textile Conservation Conference, at FIT, Nov. 2015.
Presentation on the development of a Finding Aid for the Bonnie Cashin Sketches in the Dept. of Special Collections and FIT Archives in the FIT Library (SPARC) for the American Institute for Conservation of Historic and Artistic Works (AIC) conference in Philadelphia, PA. May 2011
Exhibitions
Something Beautiful: Reframing La Colección, El Museo del Barrio, New York, NY, 2023
Fabric in Fashion, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, December 2018-May 2019
Pink: The History of a Punk, Pretty, Powerful Color, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, September 2018-January 2019
The Body: Fashion and Physique, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, December 2017-May 2018
Proust’s Muse: the Countess Greffulhe, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, September 2016-May 2017
Denim: Fashion’s Frontier, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, December 2015-May 2016
Exposed: A History of Lingerie, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, June-November 2014
Faking It: Originals, Copies and Counterfeits, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, December 2014-April 2015
A Queer History of Fashion: From the Closet to the Catwalk, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, September 2013-January 2014
Ivy Style, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, September 2012-January 2013
Fashion A-Z: Highlights from the Collection of the Museum at FIT, Parts One and Two, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, November 2011-May 2012
Daphne Guinness, Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology, New York, NY, September 2011-January 2012
Courses
- FT 653 Costume and Textile Mounting Skills
Connect
Instagram: @marjorie_jonas