We owe this Museum of Moroccan Elegance to the late Habiba Hantout (1936-2024). Passionate about Moroccan costume since a young age, librarian-researcher, Habiba Hantout had created, with great attention to detail, a superb collection representing the costumes and adornments of Morocco through the ages and provinces. “My collection began in 1980 in Casablanca. It was a personal idea, which gave rise, indeed, to more than 40 years of research, manual work, writing, art and sewing but also field investigations and collection of oral or visual testimonies with people involved in the practice and traditions of their regions (Tétouan, Fez, Oujda, etc.). As I discovered more, I made by hand, with the greatest love for our culture, these miniatures, female and male, 50 to 60 cm high, wearing well-identified costumes and adornments”, she confided to our magazine in March 2023.
This fabulous research work which “is intended to be a testimony to the enormous wealth of our national cultural heritage.It came to fruition through the 200 dolls exhibited in the Museum’s windows. Four main families of costumes make up this collection:
• “The Drapes” which constitute the basis of clothing, particularly for women: haik, ksa, melhafa, hanbel, mendil…
• “Clothing-coats” with rural weaving (tribes of the Middle and High Atlas), intended to protect against heat and cold: handira, akhnif, selham, djellaba, etc.
• “The costumes inherited from Al-Andalous” of the VIIIth have XVIIIth century: brocades marlota, caftan, bediya, jubba…
• “Modern-influenced costumes”, which developed from the expansion of creativity: feminine djellaba, modern costumes, etc.
