Winterthur Museum, Garden & Library today announced that it will host the U.S. premiere of Costumes of Downton Abbey, an original exhibition of designs from the awarding-winning television series, beginning March 1, 2014. The move adds another compelling attraction to Winterthur’s rich exhibition roster, which includes Common Destinations: Maps in the American Experience, on display through January 5, 2014, and The Look of Love: Eye Miniatures from the Skier Collection, debuting September 21, 2013, through January 5, 2014.

Winterthur’s curators will create the exhibition so that visitors will step into and experience the fictional world of Downton Abbey and the contrasting world of Winterthur founder Henry Francis du Pont and his contemporaries in the first half of the 20th century. The exhibition will run through January 4, 2015.

“Winterthur is delighted to add this artistic and historical masterpiece to our already outstanding schedule of major exhibitions,” said Winterthur Director David Roselle. “Costumes of Downton Abbey will not only showcase authentic designs from the series that has taken America by storm but also provide a remarkable educational experience by holding up a mirror to both institutions and societies. We think it’s going to be a real treat."

A co-production of Carnival Films and Masterpiece, Downton Abbey depicts life in the British household of the fictional Earl and Countess of Grantham and is one of the most popular and critically acclaimed period dramas ever produced. It has won a Golden Globe Award for Best Miniseries or Television Film and a Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Miniseries, among many other awards. It was the most watched television series on both ITV and PBS and subsequently became the most successful British costume drama series since the 1981 television serial Brideshead Revisited. By the third series, it had become one of the most widely watched television shows in the world. The Guinness World Records recognized Downton Abbey as the most critically acclaimed English-language television series of 2011.

Approximately 35 historically accurate costumes from the television show will be displayed in Winterthur’s largest gallery space. The costumes will be supplemented by photographs and vignettes inspired by the fictional program and by real life at Winterthur.

The costumes are lent by Cosprop, the world’s leading costumier to film, television, and theater. Winterthur’s most popular exhibition, Fashion in Film, which attracted more than 42,000 people over its three-month run, also featured costumes by Cosprop.

Winterthur’s current exhibition, Common Destinations, takes visitors on a thrilling journey through the 18th and 19th centuries to explore how America’s identity was inextricably linked to maps. It features more than 100 items rarely seen from Winterthur’s collections, including traditional maps on paper and images of maps on objects such as fans, ceramics, playing cards, puzzles, powder horns, globes, and more.

Coming this fall is The Look of Love, a unique exhibition on loan from the Birmingham Museum of Art that will feature hand-painted portraits of individual eyes. The trend for this art form, fragile watercolors on tiny pieces of ivory ensconced in myriad jewelry forms, dates to the late 18th century and began with a love story. Finely crafted in miniature and set in exquisite forms, both decorative and functional, each tiny eye portrait harbors enchanting stories of secret romance and love lost.

Winterthur’s popular seasonal offerings of Spring Tour, Historic Autos, Point-to-Point, and Yuletide will be thematically linked to Costumes of Downton Abbey.

In addition, Winterthur will host a wide range of lectures, workshops, and events, including “Other Downtons,” focusing on aspects of the country house in Britain and the United States. There will be a variety of programs for adults and families focusing on entertaining and country house life.