Dress and belt with awl case

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Plateau cultures thrived in the hilly steppe region between the Cascades in Washington and Oregon and the Rockies in Idaho and Montana. Garments of superior craftsmanship incorporating trade goods, such as this example, expressed personal identity and a family’s high status. The woman who made this two-hide dress lavishly covered the torso and sleeves with black-and-white beadwork, which she framed with fringes embellished with glass beads, cowry shells, bone, and two highly prized elk canines. The dress is accompanied by its own belt and awl case: awls were among the tools that women used in the preparation of animal skins.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art