Cash’s Australia Collection

Full description

Cash’s first began manufacturing name tags and woven labels in Australia in 1913, and since then countless woven name tags and badges have been sewn onto school and team jumpers. The company had its beginnings in England as silk weavers in the 1840's, when John and Joseph Cash laid the foundations for a company. After establishing an office in Melbourne in 1913, Cash's Australia subsequently opened offices in Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. Cash’s subsequently opened operations in Hong Kong, China and India. Perhaps best known for its woven name tapes for labelling school uniforms, Cash’s also manufactured woven badges for community organisations, government, sporting clubs, and textile clothing and footwear manufacturers. The RMIT Design Archives holds paper point designs for woven badges for a range of sporting and community organisations, such as high schools, the Boy Scouts, the Red Cross, as well as labels for clothing manufacturers from the 1950s. From 1947 Cash’s also began producing match day awards for the VFL, included in the collection is a design for a woven badge for the Footscray Football Club (1966). Throughout the 1980s Cash’s advertising account was in the hands of Barry Banks Blakeney (BBB), whose guard books in the collection of the RMIT Design Archives document the merchandise available during this period, the range of woven labels, and a range of commemorative spoons, trophies, key rings, metal badges, and souvenir items that were produced in conjunction with badge manufacturers, Swann & Hudson, who were based in Frankston.

The Cash’s Archive is held in one box and includes 43 paper designs on paper. The related material in the Barry, Banks Blakeney (BBB) archive has been digitized and is held in the Boxes 5 and 29.