Dilys Blum, curator of fashion at the Philadelphia Art Museum for 38 years, dies at 77

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Dilys Blum, a longtime curator of fashion and textiles at the Philadelphia Art Museum, has died. She was 77.

Blum retired last summer after 38 years at the museum. She was the head of the costumes and textiles department, responsible for maintenance and interpretation of its collections of historic clothes and fabric-based art.

“Dilys Blum leaves a remarkable legacy,” wrote Director and CEO Daniel Weiss in a statement. “Her work expanded the very idea of what belongs in an art museum and ensured that these objects are appreciated as vital expressions of culture and identity.”

Blum’s career started at the Museum of London, she then moved to the Brooklyn Museum and the Chicago Conservation Center before arriving in Philadelphia in 1987.

“Blum brought a rare combination of technical expertise and cultural insight,” museum officials wrote in a statement.

Blum explored how clothes represented the major trends of their times, echoing art movements and political tides with remarkable dexterity.

Her talents were showcased in 2019 in the exhibition “Off the Wall.” Blum put together a large show about a moment in the 1960s and ‘70s when artists blurred the line between clothes and sculpture, revealing her deep knowledge of the history of experimental textile art.

“One of the artists actually crocheted a vacuum cleaner for her sculpture class,” Blum said at the exhibition opening. “Of course you could crochet a vacuum cleaner. Why not?”

One of her last contributions to the museum before retiring was in 2025 for the exhibition “BOOM: Art and Design of the 1940s.” Blum curated clothes by the French haute couture designer Elsa Schiaparelli whose dresses responded to World War II in ways symbolic and practical.

“These very large pockets are something that lasted throughout the war,” she said in an interview last year. “She called them cash-and-carry pockets. The idea was that if you were burdened with both a handbag and a gas mask, you couldn’t carry both.”

Blum authored several books about historical fashion, including “Shocking!: The Art and Fashion of Elsa Schiaparelli” (2003), “Roberto Capucci: Art Into Fashion” (2011) and “Patrick Kelly: Runway of Love” (2021).

Blum also contributed to catalogues and scholarly books beyond the Philadelphia Art Museum. Posthumously, she will have an essay in the forthcoming catalog for the museum’s exhibition “Workshop of the World: Arts and Crafts in Philadelphia,” which is coming in July 2026.