Historical Perspective: Costumes of the Americas Museum reopens

The Costumes of the America Museum formerly located in Dean Porter Park has reopened at 1004 Sixth St. and is offering free admission on Saturdays through Oct. 15 to celebrate Hispanic Heritage Month.

The museum has everything to do with Hispanic heritage since its collection is made up of costumes, blouses, hats and accessories from Mexico and Central and South America. It traces its lineage to the Pan American Roundtable of Brownsville, which started in 1927-28 and became the Costumes of the Americas Museum in 2005, Aubrey Nielson, collections manager for the Brownsville Historical Association, said.

The costumes museum merged with the BHA in 2021, and its collection came over intact at that time.

Brownsville Historical Association Collections and Exhibits Project Coordinator Leonor C. Medina works on the Costumes of the Americas Museum’s newest exhibition “Hidden in Fabric: Stories of Tradition and Culture” at their new location, 1004 East 6th Street in Brownsville. (Miguel Roberts/The Brownsville Herald)

The new Costumes of the America Museum had its ribbon cutting on Sept. 11 and opened to the public two days later. Its inaugural exhibit, “Hidden in Fabric: Stories of Tradition and Cultures” explores fabric as a cultural indicator.

“So it represents textiles from Central, South America and Mexico and one island, the Dominican Republic. And these costumes tell stories that are interwoven through the use of patterns, colors and use of the textiles themselves that when we’re physically looking at them we wouldn’t be able to read the story but there’s deeper meanings behind them — why each culture chooses to dress this particular way,” Nielson said

“We can admire them for their physical beauty, but there’s also a beauty behind the stories that they tell and the use of the patterns and the textures. So when you read the textile panels that we have for each of the costumes you’ll get a further understanding of the story that’s inside those textiles,” she said.

A light box tells about the exhibit’s 16 display cases in Spanish.

In addition to Mexico and Central and South America, the Costumes of the Americas collection has Native American pieces, some from Asia, and from most of the hemispheres in the world, Nielson said.

The mission of the BHA is to preserve, promote and educate the community about the history and heritage of cultural arts in Brownsville, “and so the collection comes as part of that because it was collected by women of Brownsville from different areas throughout Mexico,” Nielson said.

A view of Costumes of the Americas Museum newest exhibition “Hidden in Fabric: Stories of Tradition and Culture,” which stretches beyond fashion and style and focuses on textiles’ ability to tell a story. (Miguel Roberts/The Brownsville Herald)

“They would travel and purchase these pieces. So the collection started with Bessie Johnson who created the Pan American Round Table of Brownsville,” Nielson said.

“She gathered the troops per se and had the women start collecting as part of the Pan American Round Table. …The Brownsville chapter started in 1927-28. They were No. 5 in Texas, No. 6 if you include Mexico City, but Brownsville came first, so there was El Paso, San Antonio, Laredo and Austin, the chapters were first in Texas and then came Mexico City and then came Brownsville,” she said.

The inaugural exhibit runs through Feb. 28, free on Saturdays through Oct. 15 for Hispanic Heritage Month and now a Brownsville Historical Association site. The BHA offers a museum day pass valid at all its sites, which also include the Stillman House, the Historic Complex and the Historic Brownsville Museum.

The locations are open Tuesday through Saturday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.