HUNGARIAN BRIDE

The Hungarian Bride exhibition, presented at its original venue, the Hungarian National Museum, received the professional Exhibition of the Year Award in 2024. The large-scale exhibition brings to life the stories of dozens of well-known and lesser-known women. Their carefully preserved gowns, accessories, and love letters all tell stories about changing female roles and evolving attitudes towards weddings and marriage. The exhibition takes visitors on a journey through 500 years of the history of marriage.
Richly illustrated, it highlights both the fact that women played a far more significant role in history than what has survived the filters of traditional historiography, and how women’s social roles have changed over the past five centuries, as well as how they fought for the right and the opportunity to shape their own destinies.
The Hungarian Bride exhibition at the Haáz Rezső Museum in Odorheiu Secuiesc represents a new chapter in the history of the project. While previous venues hosted travelling capsule exhibitions, the Odorheiu Secuiesc presentation has once again been created within a museum setting. It preserves the conceptual arc and thematic approach of the highly successful Budapest exhibition, while adapting them to local characteristics. The exhibition is enriched by artefacts and documents borrowed from the collections of museums and archives in Székely Land, as well as from personal collections.
A significant proportion of the objects and garments on display are here thanks to the dedication and enthusiasm of committed individuals. It is these community contributions that make the exhibition truly unique and special: alongside historical figures, it also presents people of our own time and their stories.
Almost everything in the world has changed over the past 500 years, yet some roles have remained the same. There were brides 500 years ago, and there are brides today. The question is: what has stayed the same in the way we perceive the role of the bride and of women, and what has changed? How did people think about these roles in the past, and how do we approach them today? What has shaped these attitudes across time and space, and in different circumstances?
We are exploring the answers together, but each of us will ultimately find our own answers within ourselves.

The initiator and curator of The Hungarian Bride is Dr Ildikó Simonovics, fashion historian.
Creators and partners of the exhibition: Hungarian National Museum; Haáz Rezső Museum; Liszt Institute Sfântu Gheorghe; Archives of the Archdiocese of Alba Iulia; Mureș County Museum; Szekler Museum of Ciuc.