Consuming Women’s Healthcare
Our new ExhibitLab uses the lens of science history to show how women’s healthcare products have developed over time.
On view through March 2025
Horiba Exhibit Hall
Our latest ExhibitLab explores contraceptives, menstrual products, gender-affirming products, and menopausal products through the lens of the history of science. Objects on display date back more than a century and a half—from the 1870s to the present—highlighting women’s healthcare and consumption, and how these products have evolved and been marketed to women over time.
Consuming Women’s Healthcare was curated by former Haas Curatorial Fellow Sherri Sheu, with assistance from the museum’s Scott Bowe and Molly Sampson.
About ExhibitLab
ExhibitLab is the Science History Institute’s space in the Horiba Exhibit Hall for small, focused displays that showcase specific collections, prototype new ideas, or respond to current events. Our staff members, fellows, and school and community partners curate these displays.
For more information about ExhibitLab, please contact Molly Sampson at msampson@sciencehistory.org.
Featured image: Detail of “The Only Tampon that Protects You with Double-Absorbing Action,” advertisement for Rely tampons by Procter & Gamble, 1980.
You might also like
DISTILLATIONS MAGAZINE
How Notorious Abortionist Madame Restell Built a Drug Empire
Desperate women, mistreated by the 19th century’s medical establishment, risked black-market remedies.
DIGITAL COLLECTIONS
Oral History: George Rosenkranz
Interview with the pioneering steroid researcher who was instrumental in developing the oral contraceptive.
DISTILLATIONS PODCAST
The Mothers of Gynecology
Why are Black women in America three times more likely to die during childbirth than White ones?
Horiba Exhibit Hall is named for Japanese businessman and 2006 Pittcon Heritage Award winner Masao Horiba (1924–2015), founder of Horiba Radio Laboratory, now Horiba Ltd., a manufacturer of advanced analytical and measurement technology.