Mid Winter 2000

I've wanted to visit the United Kingdom for years. The Olympics finally gave me the motivation to actually do it. And it was a fabulous experience, which I will have to repeat. Corin and I explored England, Scotland and Wales for about a month. We could have gone to other places, but we decided that there was just too much to see on one island that we didn't need to mess about visiting other European countries this time.

On our trip we saw a bit on everything - castles, palaces, ruins, churches, armouries etc, but I shall have to pick out the bits of needlework related stuff to tell you about specifically. If you want to hear about the other stuff, you'll have to catch me some other time.

There were several sites I wanted to visit specifically for the embroideries I'd heard about. Unlike Bess' trip to Europe, I wasn't studying specific pieces, so I didn't make any special appointments to see things up close. Also I wasn't travelling alone, and thus I had to consider the boredom factor of my partner. On this trip, I also wanted to see as much as possible, so getting absorbed in too much detail would have slowed me down. As it was, I have enough information and ideas to keep me going for quite some time.

I got to see embroidery on the second day we were there. The Museum of London specialises in ... well, London. Any time some sort of development takes place in London, they get to excavate first, to find artifacts of daily life in London from Roman times, when the city was founded, up until the present. They also have a lot of stuff that people have thrown into the Thames over the last 1000 years.

This place wasn't flashy but it did have a lot of information about how ordinary people lived. This was quite fascinating once you got into it. The level of detail that they went into was very good, and you could spend days there reading everything.

They had some medieval needles, needlecases and thimbles. There was also some orpherys on display. This was the first of an incredible number of them that I saw. I had no idea there was so many still surviving!!!

I'd recommend this Museum to you all, not for its embroidery, but for the way it shows ordinary objects. The items on display were things that the people used in everyday life, and mostly haven't changed purpose or design for hundreds of years. It made me think about how easy it would be to replace all my plates, cups, bottles, boxes, etc, to the correct ones for the time. (coming soon - Roman Lemmings :)

Of course, one of my reasons for visiting London was to make the pilgrimage to the Victoria and Albert Museum. This is the home of such well known pieces of embroidery such as the Syon Cope and Jane Bostocke's sampler.

Well I had almost expected to go into shock or quiver in an excited heap when we first got there, but I was able to keep it together. In fact, we had the whole day to see as much as we could, so I was sure I could use the whole afternoon to commune with the needlework.

The V&A is enormous, with a huge amount of fabulous things from all sorts of times and places. For the non-textile worshiper, the highlight was the plaster rooms, which were big vaulted spaces with plaster casts of statues (like David) and tombs and the odd cathedral facade and 50 metre tall roman column!!! They were all painted to look like stone or bronze or whatever the original was. All crammed together in full life-size. Someone had fun creating these years ago!

I didn't get to see everything in the V&A. There were rooms I didn't get into, but I would have like to see the armour and jewellery rooms. I didn't get to see everything in the textile rooms! But I certainly saw enough to fill my brain. I took a whole roll of film. The V&A lets you photograph just about everything. The photos came out pretty well considering I don't know much about cameras and everything was behind glass.

So what did I see? First there was the Medieval Treasury Room. They had the Jesse Cope and the Syon Cope on display there. It was interesting that the museum did not refer to them by names even though all the books I've read refer to embroideries by names.

There were several really early fragments of embroidery and weaving (7^th-8^th century Egyptian), as well as many 12^th century ecclesiastical embroideries. I suppose I can’t describe each one in detail cause it would take too long, and I’m not sure I’d remember.

I stopped photographing embroidery chasubles and alter clothes when I saw how many there were, so I took photos of the ones with unusual design ideas. I would have loved to have taken photos of any of them from 3cm away, but there was no way my camera could have focused close enough to pick stitch details.

From the general galleries I went into the costume section. They only had two pieces actually pre 1600. A beautiful Spanish cape - red velvet with gold couching, and a boys shirt with blue embroidery. Apart from the design on collar and cuffs, every seam was decorated, even under the arms.

From there I went upstairs to the textile room where most of the stuff was. On the way I passed through a glass door and suddenly I was surrounded by the Devonshire hunting tapestries - four metres tall in a long gallery. Very impressive.

The next bit was a bit of brain overload, as I scampered to find the right embroideries. The textile room was quite overwhelming. There were a few rooms with pieces hanging in frames on the wall, but most of the textiles were in sliding draws, in glass frames. You had to open each one to find out what was there. At first I found post 1600 stuff especially lots of lace. Eventually I found the place I wanted and stayed there for quite some time. Corin stopped by occasionally as he explored the rest of the museum. I wasn't very good company at that particular time since I was totally focused on those glass covered frames.

The setup in these rooms is designed for study. The frames could be completely pulled out and then taken to a desk nearby to work on. I was particularly surprised to see how fine all this work was. I've recently been challenging myself with some very fine counted thread work and yet all of this work was done on that level of detail. I was very impressed by it and I have a new level of appreciation of the renaissance professional embroiderer. I don't think I would have been good enough.

Mind you, I also went there to see the pieces of the Oxburgh hangings, made by Mary Queen of Scots. These pieces were quite course and rough, especially when compared to the other work present. I counted the ones on display at 12 to 14 stitches per inch. You really get the difference between the professional and the domestic embroidery.

As I said, there wasn't really enough time and yet too much time. My head hurt by the time we left, trying to remember all the details. I have photos to remind me, but you could easily go there several times and yet see something new. I didn't see all the embroideries I knew were there, but I still saw an awful lot.

I saw coifs and cushions and sections of uncut slips, especially a cunning one full of colourful animals. There were samplers, and some German counted bags. As well as Jane Bostocke’s sampler, as I mentioned before. I left with a brain full of ideas of new pieces to sew and new styles to try.

Anyway, that evening, we went to the Globe Theatre to see Hamlet. This is a reconstruction of Shakespeare's Globe from 1600's. The design of the theatre is as accurate as they could get. We were groundlings - that is, we stood for the whole performance under the sky (hoping it didn't start raining!) And while Hamlet was running around the stage, we noticed his lovely embroidered collar. I didn't know just how accurate the costumes were until were took the Globe tour later, so you'll have to wait too. But anyway, the Globe was fabulous and everyone should go see a show there.

Next episode. We get the rental car and get out of London to see yet more stuff.

From the Guildmaster of the Worshipful Company of Broiderers

The November Coronet Competion is to be ‘Embroidery for Bed, Bath and Table’ – see the article below for more information. However, because there has not been the usual reminder time, and this edition of the newsletter will be late, we have decided to extend the competition deadline to maximise the number of entries. We will still run the competition at November Coronet, and anyone who can enter a piece in the competition should do so there. These pieces will be judged (and returned) and the marks recorded. The same competition will also be run again at Twelfth Night, together with the original Twelfth Night competition, which is for pre-1000 AD embroidery. Anyone who would like to enter either or both competitions can do so at Twelfth Night and both sets of marks will be counted. As usual, however, you cannot enter the same piece for more than one Company competition, although you can enter the same piece for Company and Principality or Kingdom competitions.

From the Guild Patron of the Worshipful Company of Broiderers

I hope your winter was a mild one and that you got lots of sewing done by the fire. I hope to see the results in a competition soon.

Sorry for the delay in this midwinter issue of the newsletter. As Bartolomeo has said, most of our newsletter writers were out of action. Remember that we welcome contributions to the newsletter, and it certainly would have helped us to have some backup articles. Book reviews, shop reviews, website reviews, thread reviews are certainly helpful to everyone in the Company. We also try to have research articles covering all the upcoming competitions. If you feel confident to write about any of the categories, or just write an informed article on anything needlework, please contact Bartolomeo, or Bess or me. We would love your help.

From the Chronicler of the Worshipful Company of Broiderers

What you hold in your hands is ostensibly the Widwinter Investiture copy of the newsletter. You know and I know that Midwinter is now but a distant memory. However, along with Winter this year came the dreaded coughs and colds season and in a fit of impeccably bad timing, Mistress Bess contracted Whooping Cough and I contracted Bronchitis in the lead up to this issue. Ah sweet, sweet winter. Please accept our apologies and I hope the quality of the articles in this issue go some way towards making amends. An enormous thank you (as always) to the contributors in this issue.

This Midwinter/Spring Coronet time warp also explains why Mistress Keridwen is writing about her trip to England before she went… Confused?

Linn Skinner's Gold Work Class

I recently had the most wonderful opportunity to take a goldwork class from Linn Skinner, a very respected American embroidery teacher. She also happens to be very knowledgeable about the historical side of needlework. Believing that it is more important for her students to master the stitch or technique rather than produce a finished project, Linn opened her class by teaching us how to lay and couch gold metal thread around a simple triangle design. Using smooth passing thread No.6 (2% gold) on muslin fabric, she showed us how to take one strand of gold, bend it in the middle to form two strands, pinch the bent end, then lay the two threads down along one side of the triangle.

Having my second needle already threaded with red sewing silk thread (I used Gütermann silk thread in this case), I came up on the inside of where the gold thread was bent and stitched over it to tack it firmly down to the fabric. I then brought the needle back up again about an 1/8 inch to ¼ inch in from where I started. As I laid the two threads of gold along the one side of the triangle, I would place a simple sewing stitch at a right angle directly over the two gold threads, repeating this laying and stitching process every 1/8 –to-1/4 inch along the triangle. Eventually the colored silk stitches should form a pattern (such as brick, etc.). Linn reminded us that it was important to work the laying and couching design head on in a north-south direction, not trying to do it from an east-west or any other direction. It was important for us to keep our overlaid silk stitches at a straight right angle, rather than causing them to lean left or right.

Instead of boring you with my long interpretation of how to turn a simple corner with gold metal thread, I prefer to let you read the following excerpt from Hinda Hands’ book Church Needlework: A Manual of Practical Instruction.

“At the end (of the row) each thread is sewn separately in place and turned sharply back, then stitched at regular intervals as before, only each stitch must be placed between the ones formerly done,” she wrote. (Sometimes, I found it necessary to take the sharp ends of my scissors or a blunt end of a big tapestry or chenille needle to help force the corners to turn and keep the two gold threads fairly close together. Also, the two tacking stitches done at the corner, one over each separate thread, should be in line with each other so that it looks as if you did one big stitch over two threads instead of one stitch over each thread.)

Hands further wrote “If the space to be filled is not very long, it is usual to take only one thread to start with, instead of doubling it into two, and after drawing the end of the gold through to the ‘wrong’ side of the work, fasten it firmly, and begin at the other end of the row each time”. Besides reminding us to lay our gold smoothly and not to pull the silk thread stitches so tightly as to “indent” the gold thread, Linn taught us how to end your gold thread. To end the gold threads, use a large chenille needle or stiletto to pry open a tiny hole through the fabric in order to draw each gold thread separately through the hold. With your second needle threaded with silk, do a quick back & forth overstitch on each gold thread on the backside of the fabric and then leave 1-to-2 inches beyond the tacking before you cut the gold threads.

Linn went on to show us how to use check, purl-purl, and smooth passing gold threads. She also instructed us how to do underside couching which is another entire article in itself.

Linn obtained her gold threads from Benton & Johnson, 19-21 Great Queen Street, London, England. I have tried to contact the company to place an order at their email address: GQS@toye.demon.co.uk., but I have been unsuccessful in receiving a reply. So I would recommend contacting Linn at Skinner_sisters@compuserve.com. Her catalog and webmagazine is online at http://ourworld.compuserve.com.

Linn is quite witty and can provide you with an overload of historical tidbits. So if you ever have the opportunity to take one of her classes, don’t hesitate. You will thoroughly enjoy it!

Embroidery for Bed, Bath and Table

The November Coronet competition is for household embroidery from any period in the Middle Ages, that is the embroidery used for such items as towels, pillow-cases, bed hangings, table-cloths and table napkins, rather than for clothing, or ceremonial purposes. Not surprisingly, it is quite rare for these items to still exist, since they would have been used for everyday purposes, and their owners would have rarely thought of them as worth saving for posterity. There are a few extant examples, however, and embroidered examples are more likely to have been preserved than plain ones. There are also many depictions of such objects in paintings and manuscript illuminations that we can use for inspiration.

There are some examples of existing embroidered towels in the Victoria and Albert Museum. These are German and from the fifteenth and sixteenth century, embroidered in counted thread techniques in linen or silk threads on linen ground fabric. They are all quite small, and would be more suitable for use as hand towels and than bath towels. An example is shown in Kay Staniland’s book The Embroiderers, p. 63. This towel is embroidered in needle-woven patterns in silk of several colours, which produce a similar effect to patterns in contemporary weaving, and it was common for embroiderers in Northern European countries to imitate the patterns which were woven on table and bed linen produced in Italy.

There are many examples of such woven or embroidered towels, table-cloths and bed-sheets in paintings and manuscript illuminations, particularly from Italy and the Low Countries. They are almost always shown with single-coloured decoration in blue or black, and in the case of rectangular items, the short ends are decorated with one or more bands of embroidery. The ends are usually finished with fringing, and some of the later examples actually use simple macrame knots to decorate the ends. (Yes, macrame is period, I have seen an example in the National Gallery of Victoria in Melbourne, but you should not take that as an invitation to make 1970s style plant-pot holders or owls!) A good source for pictures of this sort of embroidery is the Medieval Women calendars, which have been put out each year for some time now. I used a picture in one of these, together with a pattern from a period pattern book to make one of the towels which was presented to Prince Cornelius and Princess Morwenna on behalf of the Company at Midwinter.

Santina Levey’s recent book, An Elizabethan Inheritance: the Hardwick Hall Textiles (National Trust, London, 1998), also discusses embroidered textiles for household use, including bed-hangings, table-carpets and pillow-covers. Some table-carpets, embroidered in heavy canvas work are shown (pp. 56 and 57), along with a beautiful pillow-cover, worked in very delicate red and green running and cross-stitches (p. 45).

Earlier examples of household embroidery are even more rare, but we know that they existed from the evidence of wills and inventories from earlier times. One such inventory was made in 1397, when the Duke of Gloucester was seized and all his assets were imprisoned. (Viscount Dillon and W.H. St. John Hope, ‘Inventory of the Goods and Chattels belonging to Thomas, Duke of Gloucester, and Seized in his Castle at Pleshy, Co. Essex, 21 Richard II. (1397) with their Values, as Shown in the Escheator’s Accounts’, The Archaeological Journal, vol. LIV, 1897, pp. 275-308.) This document describes a ‘great bed of gold’, that is, bed-hangings of cloth of gold, with a valance of ‘fine blue satin wrought with Garters of gold’, sybolising that their owner was a member of the Order of the Garter. Several other beds in this inventory are also described as being embroidererd with heraldic devices or badges. These must have been very grand indeed - the ultimate accoutrements for your Rowany Festival pavillion!

Opus Anglicanum

This past June Crown was not the first time I had entered an embroidery competition, but it certainly was my first attempt at Opus Anglicanum. When I first heard those 2 words…they sounded mysterious…like an exotic ritual. But I was fascinated with how the gold thread was applied and how the sheen from the silk threads seemed to change as you moved the lighting.

I based my design on the embroidery known as the John of Thanet Panel, created between 1300 and 1330 A.D. and originally forming part of a cope. John of Thanet was described as a “Monk and Chaunter of this church (Canterbury Cathedral) well vers’d in the Mathematicks; but especially skill’d in Musick. (He died in 1330 at the age of 92). He set the Services and[1] Offices for this church to Musick and wrote some Legends of Saints.”1

Opus Anglicanum, a Latin term for “work of the English”, refers to a style of embroidery produced primarily by the English, during the period 1250-1350 A.D. Embroiderers such as Beryl Dean claim that this period “coincides with the finest architectural and artistic achievements in England” (cathedrals, illuminated manuscripts, stained glass windows, etc.). Such religious works as the John of Thanet panel would have been produced by professional embroiderers who worked hand-in-hand with professional designers or were designers themselves. In addition such works would have been most likely commissioned by royalty or the religious hierarchy. Since such work was respected and coveted, many of these religious embroideries were given as gifts to churches, popes, bishops, etc. to celebrate, commemorate or placate.

Characteristic of the Opus Anglicanum period was its English professional craftsmanship, use of gold work to emphasize the glory of God, and the focus on ecclesiastical vestments. Also the treatment of embroidered figures during this period was characteristically associated with Opus Anglicanum: (1) Use of split stitch for the faces worked in fine silk thread and in spirals on the cheeks and chin, (2) Protrucing eyes, (3) Bi-colored hair and beard, (4) High foreheads, (5) Underside couching of the gold metal thread, and (6) Framing the figures within arches, arcades, large circles or quatrefoils surrounded by symbols.

The original Thanet panel was of “purple silk embroidered with gilt & silver thread and coloured silks in split stitch and couched work and small pearls”2. I used dupioni silk fabric for the ground lined with linen to provide weight for the gold work. A.G.I Christie noted that “silk fabrics, except when very thick, are lined with linen”,3 as was typical for most Opus work. Although I selected dupioni silk, twill silk was the more common silk used during the Opus period.

For the faces, body and drapery I used a single ply of Kreinik’s Ping Ling silk thread done in split stitch, one of the two most common stitches used on Opus embroideries. This same stitch had previously been used on the 10^th century Anglo-Saxon embroidered stole and maniple found with the body of St. Cuthbert. During the Opus period, a type of untwisted silk thread referred to as “floss” would have been used.4 The judges noted that I should have emphasized the protrucing forehead, and the stitches for the face should have been tighter (in terms of density), which I had realized once I bought some reading glasses! These silk threads are so fine that doing the “split” in tiny (1/16^th to 1/8^th inch) stitches requires amazing eyesight and magnification.

As a sidenote, after the competition I discovered that Kreinik was discontinuing its distribution of Ping Ling silk thread, not that the thread itself was no longer going to be manufactured.

The folds of the garb, which I found most difficult, were exaggerated to try to reflect 3 different shades of color. In error I actually used 4 shades for the blue garb. However, I tried to correct that on the outer cape once I discovered how such folds should be treated…with the dark color on the outline of each fold and the lighter color inside..

For the garb trim I surface couched with Japan #5 gold thread with the threads couched down 2 at a time with one strand of Ping Ling silk thread. Japan gold is made from narrow strips of gilded paper which was introduced into England around 1860. According to Christie, at the time of Opus Anglicanum, gold thread consisted of thin strips of prepared gold metal wound around a core of silk thread. Also, gold threads were couched very close together, and silver metal threads were used “sparingly” during this period.5 Due to the expense of obtaining thread of real gold, I opted for Japan gold.

Hair and beard were done in split stitch in alternating light and dark colors of brown and yellow, although other bi-colors used during this period included green and amber, blue and white, black and white, blue and buff, sienna and brownish black, and yellow and black.

For the halo or nimbus, I did underside couching vertically in a chevron pattern with Japan #5 gold thread couched down below the surface with linen thread; so that the linen thread is not visible above.6 Although this stitch was also used in Sicily and “occasionally in France and Italy”, it was perfected in England in the late 13^th and 14^th centuries.7 The chevron pattern was one of several geometrical patterns, some quite complex, used during this period in conjunction with underside couching.

Although the underside couching technique is a fairly simple stitch to learn, I had several problems in finding the proper linen thread and keeping the chevron pattern in tact. It would have proved easier to do this stitch directly on linen where the pattern could have been worked more precisely according to counted warps and wefts. Also, it’s much easier to draw the design on linen fabric than silk.

I enclosed the figure in a typical canopy or arcade used in early 14^th c. embroidery. Such arcading was quite common in Opus work and was closely linked to the “peculiarly English perpendicular style of architecture”.8 The arcade was done with one strand of Ping Ling silk thread in split stitch. Similar arcading can be found in the early 14^th c. Butler-Bowden (V&A) and the 13^th c. St. Sylvester (Vatican) copes.

When completed, the background will be “powdered” with crescents (symbol of enlightenment and honor) rather than completely embroidered, since silk grounds were rarely completely covered with embroidery as opposed to linen ground fabric during this period.9 Symbolic figures such as eagles, lions, angels, stars and crescents were commonly used to “powder” silk vestments such as the 13^th c. Ascoli-Piceno cope and the Coronation Mantle of Otto IV.10

When completed, this needlework will be used for a book cover. My inspiration is the “Felbrigge Psalter”, which was actually a 13^th c. psalter that belonged in the late 14^th c. to Anne Felbrigge, a nun in a Suffolk convent. The embroidery dates between 1300 and 1330 and was done in silver gilt thread and colored silks in surface couching and split stitch on linen. It is speculated that underside couching wasn’t used because it wouldn’t have allowed the fabric to lay flat against the book cover.

For anyone wishing to explore this technique, I would suggest seeking out the A.G.I. Christie’s English Medieval Embroidery, which is considered the “Bible” on Opus Anglicanum. I viewed a copy through the local library on loan from a university library. Another suggestion: when working with Ping Ling or similar fine silk thread, I would suggest using tiny quilting needles to keep the thread from slipping out of the eye of the needle. Also, experimenting with density when laying out the gold thread for underside couching is also necessary.

Bibliography

Dean, Beryl. Ecclesiastical Embroidery. Charles T. Branford Co., Newton Centre 50, Mass. 1958.

Hands, Hinda M. Church Needlework. The Faith Press Ltd., London, Eighth Edition, 1961.

Johnstone, Pauline. The Byzantine Tradition in Church Embroidery. Alec Tiranti, London 1967.

Victoria & Albert Museum Department of Textiles. Catalogue of English Ecclesiastical Embroideries of the XIII to XVI Centuries, London, 1930.

Victoria & Albert Museum. Opus Anglicanum. (Catalog of Opus Anglicanum Exhibition in Sept. 26-Nov.24, 1963), The Arts Council, 1963.

[1]1 Williamson, Paul. Medieval Treasury. Victoria and Albert Museum, London, 1986, Pg. 193.

(Taken from The History and Antiquities of the Cathedral Church of Canterbury, J. Dart, 1726,

Page 184.)

2 Ibid, Pg. 193.

3 Christie, A.G.I. English Medieval Embroidery. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1938, Pg. 19.

4 Christie, A.G.I. English Medieval Embroidery. Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1938, Pg. 20.

5 Ibid, Pg. 20.

6 Ibid, Pg. 22.

7 Johnstone, Pauline. The Byzantine Tradition in Church Embroidery. Alec Tiranti, London, 1967, Pg. 67.

8 Dean, Beryl. Eccleasiastical Embroidery. Charles T. Branford Co., Newton Centre 50, Mass. 1958, Pg. 19.

9 Christie, A.G.I. English Medieval Embroidery, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1938, Pg. 19.

10 Ibid. Pg. 73.

Forthcoming Competitions

The Bed, Bath & Table Competition (needleworked table linen, towels and other domestic napery)

Underwear – an item of embroidered or beaded underwear (chemise, petticoat, coif etc), technique open.

Headwear – an embroidered or beaded item to be worn on the head (hat, headcloth, coif etc), technique open.

Worshipful Company of Broiderers of Lochac

Guild Newsletter, Issue 7 – Mid Winter Investiture, AS XXXV

What I Did on My Holidays (Part 1)

by Keridwen the Mouse does Britain - Sept/Oct 2000