Though law and fashion may not initially seem like overlapping domains, given the central nature of each of these fields it is no surprise that they do have an impact on one another. Over the years, fashion has been important to decisions about how jurists visually demonstrate their expertise and law has served to circumscribe how fashion is created, distributed, and consumed.

Magna Carta at the Harvard Law School Library

First written in 1215, the ideas of liberty and human rights contained in and derived from England’s Magna Carta (the Great Charter) have persisted for 800 years. They have provided inspiration for developments in law now enshrined in constitutions and treaties across the world. The survival and resonance of those ideas is reflected in the manuscripts currently on display in our exhibit "One Text, Sixteen Manuscripts: Magna Carta at the Harvard Law School Library."