Leeds Discovery Centre tours reveal fans’ secret language

A folding fan made around the 1680s opens onto a pivotal scene from the Trojan War: Paris choosing the most beautiful of three goddesses. Visitors can see this unusually detailed survivor among more than 400 fans held at Leeds Discovery Centre during its regular, pre-booked store tours.

The tours are open to the general public under the museum’s Give What You Can model, with visitors invited to donate if they are able. Leeds City Council’s source announcement does not specify an individual tour date or start time, so prospective visitors must check the current schedule and book before attending.

More than 400 fans reveal changing fashions

The Leeds Museums and Galleries collection contains fans dating mainly from the 18th and 19th centuries. Their painted and carved designs range from classical scenes of love to colourful birds and Far Eastern imagery.

The oldest highlighted example depicts The Judgement of Paris. According to Greek mythology, the Trojan prince chose Aphrodite over Hera and Athena by presenting her with a golden apple. The choice set in motion the abduction of Helen and the Trojan War, giving the accessory a narrative extending far beyond its original use.

Natalie Raw, curator of costume for Leeds Museums and Galleries, said fans were once essential elements of a high-society woman’s outfit. Their imagery often carried themes of love and courtship, while gestures such as a flutter or a glance over a fan could attract attention. Those behaviours helped establish the popular idea of a secret language communicated through fans.

The collection also charts a shift in taste. Smaller and less ostentatious fans became fashionable as simpler styles of dress emerged during the Georgian period in the early 19th century.

Botanical lessons, riddles and Leeds collectors

Some pieces preserve evidence about the people who printed, collected or owned them. Two bear the name of Sarah Ashton, a female printer working in Covent Garden in the late 1700s.

One is an educational fan featuring botanical drawings and methods for classifying plants. Another is printed with riddles and is recorded as having belonged to Isabel Kennedy of Leeds.

Many fans entered the collection during the late 19th and early 20th centuries, when collecting antique examples became a pastime among wealthy women. Those collectors included Lady Gascoigne of Lotherton and Dorothy Una Ratcliffe, a socialite connected through marriage to West Yorkshire’s Brotherton family.

The store tour also places the fans within Leeds Museums and Galleries’ much broader holdings, allowing visitors to encounter objects normally kept behind the scenes while learning how curators catalogue and conserve them. Several fans are separately on display at Lotherton as part of the Botanically Beautiful exhibition.

Booking a Leeds Discovery Centre store tour

Leeds Discovery Centre is open to the public for pre-booked store tours. Admission follows a Give What You Can approach rather than a fixed price: visitors may donate while booking online or place cash and coins in the reception donation box.

The supplied announcement gives no specific tour date, start time, street address, transport guidance or accessibility information. Visitors should therefore consult the current Leeds Museums and Galleries listing before choosing a date and completing the required advance booking.

Source: Leeds City Council