From peg dolls to Barbie, tin soldiers to spacemen, toys reflect society, offering a window to the past and an insight into our ever-changing culture.

Showcasing the beloved toys of Sydneysiders, Sydney toy manufacturers and Sydney toy stores, this exhibition offers a mix of the familiar and the forgotten and a fascinating trip down memory lane.

Let your imagination fly as you follow the kids’ trail through the exhibition to the play space, where you can play traditional games and make your own toy to take home.

You’ve never seen such an amazing collection in all your life! Toys of every kind to thrill and delight you – quaint old toys, brilliant new ones, strange toys, familiar toys, wonderful toys… an attraction for young and old!

Toys Through Time Exhibition
Museum of Sydney
28 March 2015 – 9 August 2015
www.sydneylivingmuseums.com.au

Organised by the world’s leading museum of art and design, the Victoria and Albert Museum, London, this exhibition features more than 80 garments from the V&A’s extensive collection of underwear, many which have never before been on public display. It spans 350 years of fashion history, bringing together the garments that secretly and privately reduced, lifted, padded, adorned, revealed and concealed the body.

From corsets and petticoats, brassieres and boudoir wear to bustles, Undressed explores underwear’s function in decorating and manipulating the body.

Highlights include Queen Victoria’s undergarments, one of the earliest known bras, and many rare, delicate and beautifully detailed items worn by some of the world’s most glamorous women. Men’s underclothes will also be revealed, as will everyday essentials by major retailers such as Marks & Spencer.

From the dramatic engineering of a 17th century iron corset through to the satin revolution of the Wonderbra, see striking pieces by world famous fashion designers, Calvin Klein, Christian Dior, to the avant-garde freedom of Gianni Versace, Jean Paul Gaultier and Vivienne Westwood.

Undressed: 350 years of underwear in fashion
28 March – 12 July 2015
Powerhouse Museum, Sydney
www.maas.museum/powerhouse-museum