Rooms closed temporarily

The Museo del Traje. Centro de Investigación del Patrimonio Etnológico will temporarily cease its public activity

From March 2nd, the Museo’s exhibition rooms will remain closed for the start of refurbishment works to the building which must meet the requirements of the building inspection, Inspección Técnica de Edificios (ITE). The intervention approved by the Ministry for Culture and Sports will affect façades, ceilings and rooftops with an investment of 1,425,785.98 euros. Following refurbishments, the museum spaces will be better adapted to the institution’s needs. The cultural assets that make up the permanent exhibition and the entire collection the Museo houses will remain in the building, protected in the warehouses. It will not be necessary to transfer the pieces to a different location.

The building of the Museo del Traje was designed in 1969 by the architects Jaime López de Asiaín and Ángel Díaz Domínguez as the centre of the Museo Español de Arte Contemporáneo, created in 1968 and inaugurated on the property of the Ciudad Universitaria in 1975.

Located in a natural setting with gardens of over 25,000 m2, it’s one of the first buildings designed as a museum in Spain. Its architects, following the recommendations resulting from the Conference on the Art of Museum Architecture held in Mexico in 1968, created a neutral, flexible space that could be transformed through modules to organise the exhibition of works, creating a complete continuity of the whole that intentionally removed it from the traditional museum architecture concept. Its exceptional design was distinguished with the National Architecture Award in 1969. Since its construction, the building has been the object of numerous expansion and renovation projects, among which those by the architect Antonio Fernández Alba in 1982 particularly stand out. He added the original project of three rooms for temporary exhibitions; also of note were that of the team comprising Darío Gazapo, Concha Lapayese and Ángel Luis Sousa, who redesigned the outside spaces; and the design of spaces aimed at the permanent exhibition of the Museo del Traje, which was the work of Ginés Sánchez Hevia.

During this period, the museum staff will continue to work on studying the collection, the conservation and the documentation of the pieces. It will advance in the development of temporary exhibitions of varying natures and in the design of a complete programme of cultural activities that the Museo will offer after reopening on completion of the works.

We deeply regret the inconvenience the TEMORARY CLOSURE of the Museo might cause you.