American Textile History Museum

Location: 491 Dutton Street, Lowell

Time: Tue - Fri 9am - 4pm, Sat - Sun 10am - 5pm

Age appropriateness: All ages

Cost: Varies

The beginnings of what we know today as the American Textile History Museum were in 1960 when Caroline Stevens Rogers founded the Merrimack Valley Textile Museum in North Andover in Massachusetts. Throughout the years, the name and location were changed, but the mission is still the same - to tell America’s story through the art, history, and science of our textiles.

In 1992, the American Textile History Museum moved into the historic Kitson Building in Lowell.  This move allows the Museum to expand its space to 150,000 square feet and to offer the community not only the Textiles in America exhibition but also a number of other programs and services. 

Textiles in America

The permanent exhibit Textiles in America shows through textiles, tools, machines, photographs, advertising ephemera, and other artifacts how people have used art and science over the past 250 years to create beautiful and useful textiles. More than 500 artifacts from the Museum's collections are used in both imaginative period settings and in gallery displays which tell America's story through the art, science and history of its textiles.

Family Fun
A special hands-on program is presented every Sunday at 2pm with stories, crafts, quilt projects, fiber arts and more. Free with Museum admission.