A Unique Vintage Needle Arts Sampler

1879 English Needlework Sampler

Just a quick post to share a truly remarkable sampler that I saw the other night on Antiques Roadshow! It was from the "Vintage Toronto" broadcast, which updated the prices on the objects originally assessed in 1999, and this has been the show's only Canadian adventure to date (although we did have a spin-off for a while).

The Sampler was stitched by *Maria Taylor - the bottom center panel with the neat drawn-work edging has her information - as her application for the position of Home Economics teacher in 1879. What is amazing to me is not only all the small samples of different needlework types but the way it is presented, in the beautiful frame with the hand-made triangular rickrack around it! Needless to say, she got the job :)

(*In the Appraisal Transcript, the Appraiser says "Harriet" was the stitcher and the owner - the stitcher's grand-daughter - does not correct him, but in the last photo of the slideshow, it is clear that first letter is an M, as it is identical to that letter as she stitched it for "St. Marie's School", so Maria is my best guess at the actual stitching!)

The pictures on the website are a bit blurry, but you can see the full video of the Appraisal here at PBS, and it is well worth watching!!! Maria was an amazingly talented stitcher, and has everything from teeny tiny knitted socks to perfect miniature dresses (the sundress and crocheted hat above her signature panel is especially cute). I'd love a clearer look at it, but I noticed panels of needle darning and weaving, hand quilting, smocking, embroidery and needlelace work.

In the center is a wonderful petit point design of a handsome hound:

And my very favourite aspect is the impossibly delicate sheet music bars, from "Home Sweet Home", above the hound panel. The detail is so incredibly fine and accurate, I think you could actually play from it! And it's such a lovely sentiment :) 

It sort of sums up the whole display - the samples are the epitome of the domestic arts, which speaks to the importance of the idea of family life at the time. Because when she made this spectacular Sampler, not only was she applying for a paying job as a teacher but she was - like most women at the time - also proving her competence in "home making" skills which would be an asset in a marriage match. 

Her full-sized work must have been gorgeous, and we know from the conversation that she did marry and start a family. I imagine that her children must have been beautifully clothed :) What a lovely testament to a very talented lady's abilities! 

Unfortunately, I wasn't able to find any information on whether the Sampler was sold, but hopefully that means that it will be passed down through the family and treasured for generations to come. It's truly priceless as an heirloom but it has also maintained it's monetary value at $1500 to $2500, from 1999 to 2013 :) 

Personally, I find this piece to be incredibly inspiring! I've become very interested in trying different styles of needlework lately but I'm wary of committing to an entire project in one style. Especially since the fine linen work - drawn thread, darning, weaving and the like - are so tedious to work. I was thinking of doing little samples, but had no idea what to do with them when finished, and that seemed wasteful.

I really like this idea of framing them all together in a display, although I would try something on a MUCH smaller scale LOL! Maybe an 8 x 10 frame ;) What about you?

PBS also has an archive of all their Needlework Appraisal Videos - Happy Browsing!

Book Review: The Embroiderer's Story

Many sticky notes are the sign of a really good read! Er, that's my excuse anyway ;)

It's a little bit embarrassing to admit that this post has been over two years (eek!) in the making! Way back in 2012, I wrote about the Jane Bostocke Sampler (JBS) and shared a photo of the sampler from this book, intending to write the review soon. Well, it's finally here! LOL Hope it will be worth the wait ;)

The Embroiderer's Story: Needlework from the Renaissance to the Present Day by Thomasina Beck was first published as a hardcover in 1995, with this paperback edition following in 1999. The first thing that struck me is the sheer size of the book! It's not especially thick, but it's definitely larger than average. I've put a regular size market paperback (Sharon Shinn's Quatrain) alongside to demonstrate scale.

The beautiful cover art is a painting from 1913 called "I am Half-Sick of Shadows" by artist Sidney Harold Meteyard. It shows the Lady of Shallot (from the poem by Lord Alfred Tennyson) waiting for her lover, and whiling away the hours with embroidery. The background is a vintage Morris & Co. embroidered bedcover from 1889.

Thomasina Beck's Publisher, David & Charles (which was taken over by F+W Media), followed this design theme for her other popular books: The Embroiderer's Garden (1997), The Embroiderer's Flowers (1992, later reissued in this edition to match) and Gardening with Silk and Gold: A History of Gardens in Embroidery (1998). This discussion thread states that the latter is a revised edition of Embroidered Gardens: A Studio Book from 1979. Frustratingly, there is little information about Beck online!

One day, I would love to read more of her works, especially the Gardening in Silk and Gold. Unfortunately, all of her books appear to be out of print and very hard to find. I was lucky enough to find The Embroiderer's Story in a local library collection. It's a wonderful introduction for anyone interested in historical needlework styles!

Although there is a lot of information here, and the text is well-researched, it's all presented in a very accessible tone. One chapter flows into the next and it makes for entertaining and inspiring reading! This is more of a general interest book than an academic treatise, which is unusual and refreshing. The pictures don't always line up with the text though - there will be a page of text on needlepainting, for example, but the illustrations only turn up three pages later - but it's a minor inconvenience.

There are six chapters in all, covering the major stylistic eras. The pages are thick glossy paper with some stunning full-colour pictures, and the layout takes good advantage of all that extra space with frequent use of diagrams like these:

Pages 28 and 29 from Chapter 1, "The Elizabethan Embroiderer"

Please pardon my fingers in the photos, but I had to hold the pages flat somehow!

This is a typical layout for what I came to think of as the "inspiration" pages: photos (often colour) of historic pieces and ephemera with complimentary themes/links on one side with B&W sketches showing how the motifs might be adapted for new work on the other. These inspiration illustrations were done by Belinda Downes.

Page 24, close-up, from Chapter 1, "The Elizabethan Embroiderer"

Other design examples, like this blackwork grapevine with filling stitch suggestions, actually came from embroidery books, patterns, magazines, or manuals of the time. These types of details make the book an amazing scrapbook-like assemblage of all kinds of interesting bits that place the works within the cultures of their own times. Indeed, in the Introduction (8), Beck says that it was just simple curiosity as to how and why these things were made that led her to dig deeper into the past:

"Histories, biographies, novels, diaries and poems provided some answers, and I began piecing snippets of information together, as one might a collage, hoping thereby to build up a picture of what is was like to be an embroiderer at that time."

As a result, reading the book feels like undertaking that journey of discovery right alongside Beck as she rifles through all sorts of sources and displays examples for us to enjoy. It's a general history of styles, and so is not a project book or stitch guide but rather a sort of inspirational research journal. But there are technique hints:

Pages 60 and 61 from Chapter 3, "The Georgian Embroiderer"

As an example, this small diagram actually shows the best way to work tambour embroidery, in a laced frame or the tight hoop from which the method gets its name (a tambour is a type of drum, and refers to the tight tension necessary for the work). It actually makes a great deal of sense that the illustrations of older times were so intricate as most readers had limited literacy and printers had limited book space!

Here is one of my favourite examples of historical needlework in the book:

This twining floral design, worked with silks on a hostess apron in 1736 (page 63, Chapter 3) is still so beautiful! I really like the heavy shading in the center carnation, which looks a little like a whirligig with its fringed petals, and the roses :)

This sort of twining vine-based floral embellishment was very popular in this time, as also shown on this handsome crewelwork waistcoat from the 1740s (71, Chapter 3).

Page 104, close-up, from Chapter 5, "The Victorian Embroiderer"

Brightly coloured wools surged in popularity in the Victorian era when new dyes were developed; unfortunately, many of them were unstable and many works did not survive. A style of counted embroidery known as "Berlin Woolwork" soon became a fad (much criticized for poor taste and lack of style in its time!), and was the direct ancestor of modern cross-stitch! I really love this style, which is based on florals and geometrics with shading so intense that it often clashes. It is amazing to think that the hand-painted graphed charts eventually gave way to the craft we know today :)

Among the other odds and ends, each chapter also has a delightfully imagined pincushion drawn by quilter Paddy Killer. All her illustrations for this book can be seen on this page. My favourite one is this Victorian sewing garden (Chapter 5, 115)!

Towards the end of the era, the influence of the modernizing Arts & Crafts movement lead by William Morris becomes evident, with a preference for naturalistic motifs. These tiny Christening mittens embroidered by his daughter May Morris are sweet :)

Here is my absolute favourite work in this book, a blackwork and goldwork pillow:

Amazingly, although it looks eras older, this is a 20th Century reproduction! The caption (141; photo on 140, Chapter 6) says: "Fascination with Elizabethan history and embroidery led Jack Robinson to take up blackwork, explore the intricate patterns and then devise his own, as in this book cushion, 1992."

I really love the diamond windowpane border, the way the gold sparkles against the black, and the scattering of seed pearls throughout the embroidery. No flower seems to be exactly alike in shape or filling! It's just so elegant and striking :)

In the previous eras, needlework was fairly strictly limited to the popular culture of the time, with fads that came and went. But the Twentieth-Century Embroiderer has the option to break all those old bonds as well as honor them, and so Beck spends the final chapter with new works inspired by old techniques. This colourful "Passion for Tulips" feltwork by Jennifer Wilson (1994, page 153) is an example of this freedom.

It is so easy to take our creative impulses for granted! Although this book is very encouraging and inspiring, reading through the various styles really brings home how important popular culture was to needlework. You did whatever was "in", whether you liked it - or were good at it! - or not. And then the next fad came along, and you abandoned your old work as being of no value and moved on to the newest craze.

The accomplishment was in the act of creating, not so much the actual creation. It's absurd to think today that ladies in the Victorian era once took up certain styles of crafting just to show off their wrists to potential suitors! Or that needlework was just another dreary "domestic art" one had to master in order to wed and live well.

On the other hand, it is encouraging to imagine these same ladies cozily crafting around a parlour in the evenings, chatting and laughing with friends while they worked at their needlework or crochet or knitting, proud to show off their skills to one another :) As bloggers, perhaps that is what we do too, only now we are free to create whatever we will, whenever we please. It is a privilege we should cherish!

And the final thing that caught my eye is this illustration by Paddy Killer towards the end of the book (page 154, Chapter 6). It's an imagining of The Embroiderer's Story - and Beck's other books - as a searchable digital resource. Wouldn't that be cool?!

ES SAL: 15 Inspiring Tassel Tutorials!

I'm still working on the Tassel Tutorial! Better late than never, right?! ;)

This is the tassel I'll be basing my tutorial on:

I made it a while ago to match my as-yet-unfinished bookmark (the design is the beautiful freebie Jeanne Dansby offered as a thank you to her blog readers at Byrd's Nest back in August 2011 - goodness gracious, has it really been that long?!).

I took a TON of pictures at the time, but sadly it wasn't until I looked them over recently that I realized that most of them didn't turn out! ARGH. So I'm going to be remaking the tassel, using embroidery thread instead. For this one, I used two colours of Perle (Pearl) Cotton #8, a plain green and a very pretty multicolour that was a gift from a friend :) I braided my cord for a change and I really like it!!!

In the meantime, there is a tutorial for a braided tie tassel similar to my own over at the fashion blog The Aestate. Although the example is *massive* the steps are much the same, but with a different cardboard winding method (the classic "H" cutout).

And that's not all - I've also found some other interesting tutorials online! When I started looking around, I was trying to limit my searches to bookmark tassels but the results were a bit disappointing, so I've included other projects that could easily be adapted. There are a lot of text-only tutorials, but I've focused on ones with photos.

As Sew4Home explain in their illustrated guide, "How to Make a Tassel", any tassel has four basic parts, the tie (which is often the cord itself), the head (or top) of the bundle (which is usually rounded and often worked over a wooden or plastic form to keep the shaping), the wrap under the head and then the dangly bundle (or body):

Since the shape doesn't tend to change much for simple little tassels like these (in the Victorian needlework books I've been reading over the last few months, it seems that tassels were once very elaborate and multi-layered!), it's the materials that can really change the look. For finishing stitcheries, I like to use embroidery floss because I can easily match it to my project threads, but other materials can add a nice contrast too!

Tassels Made With Embroidery Floss

1. Emma at the DMC Threads blog has an excellent Basic Tassel Tutorial! She uses a rectangle of cardboard to wind the floss around, which is what I like to do too :)

2. The Prudent Homemaker blog has a great post with lots of printable bookmarks and shows how to make a classic and elegant hidden-knot tassel with twisted cord. This tassel uses only one skein embroidery floss! It's also wound on cardboard.

3. Racaire's Embroidery & Needlework has a tutorial for a tiny little red tassle with a contrasting white tie for ornament corners that could easily be adapted. She also shows a version with a Turks Head Knot top, and provides links for the knot how-to.

4. Blogger Lou Lou Downtown also has a single-skein tassel (along with a yarn tassel for the end of a scarf) in the cleverly named post "It's No Hassle to Make a Tassel"! She cut a short length of thread to use as a tie and then cut the remaining skein in half, so you may need to add more thread for cording, or to make it fluffier!

5. Fashion bloggers A Beautiful Mess do something similar, but cleverly tie the skein in the middle and cut it at the ends! Again, you'll need extra thread for the cording. They use their tassels as a colourful and cute trim for a basic black fabric scarf.

6. Fellow fashion blogger Hammers and High Heels does much the same but fancies it up with a jump ring tie, and includes excellent close-up photos and info on trimming!

7. This tutorial for a Tassel Necklace uses the easy Cardboard Slot Method (for wont of a better name, LOL) of winding and also only one skein of floss!

8. And this DIY Neon Tassel Necklace tutorial (evidently these were a big thing last year!) shows you how to wrap the threads using just your hand.

9. There is an even cleverer version of the Cardboard Slot Method at Generally Creative with extra slits for holding the tie in place while wrapping!

10. Also, the blog All About Ami shows the basics of wrapping with two colours; the example is a tiny graduation-hat tassel for an adorable little crochet bear!

Tassels Made With Other Materials

11. The blog Go Make Me has a very basic tassel made with pretty variegated twine.

12. Scrapbookers Oh So Beautiful Paper have a fancy gold thread tassel, and a very neat way to present bookmarks as gifts using cardstock and adhesive photo corners (theirs is for a moving announcement, but the idea could be used for any occasion)!

13. The jewellery blog Scarlet Calliope has a beautiful ribbon tassel with a soldered metal cap, but includes notes for finishing it off with more lovely ribbon instead.

14. There is an ingenious method of wrapping using a crochet hook and a ruler, with wool, on the Swedish blog MiA that would likely work with embroidery thread too!

15. And for a really unique look, Tintocktap (now Unnumbered Stitches) shows how to make crochet tassels; the pink one with the beads is really cute!

And finally, for some historical context:

There is an excellent series on Tassels for Costumes, based on historical examples, on costume-maker Lynn McMasters' website. The very interesting Part I: Simple Thread Tassels shows examples of the effect different threads can gives, illustrations of tassel making and a photo-tutorial on twisting cording. Part II: Compound Thread Tassels is more complicated, using wooden head forms, but the effect is very lovely! (Note: Part III: Beaded Tassels wouldn't work for me; the link seems to be broken).

And for more eye-candy, LOL, here is a blog post full of historical tassels!

So, what do you think? Do you love tassels, or do you think they're too much hassle?

The Jane Bostocke Sampler

Recently, I've been lucky enough to stumble upon some books about the history of needlework in my local library, and have been reading about some very interesting pieces of work :) Some of the earliest pieces are mentioned time and again, and one of these is Jane Bostocke's Sampler, worked in a variety of different techniques, including blackwork. The JBS is considered to be the earliest dated sampler, as Jane stitched both her name and the date she finished the work - 1598 - and the birthdate and name of the intended recipient of her gift, cousin Alice Lee, born in 1596.

This is a photograph of the sampler from the Victoria & Albert Museum: Search The Collections website, item access number T.190-1960, where it currently resides:

According to Thomasina Beck, in her excellent book "The Embroiderer's Story: Needlework from the Renaissance to the Present Day" (which I'll be reviewing at length in a future post): “The complex stitches and patterns are crowded on to the rectangle of handspun and woven linen, with enough of each to show how it would have looked on a cuff or pillow cover. A strawberry pattern in detached buttonhole stitch leaves one fruit half finished and another waiting to be filled in, as if Jane were inviting Alice to prove her mastery of the stitch by completing them" (17).

Here is the black and white version of the sampler as it appears in Beck's book (19):

And the full two-page spread Beck devoted to the JBS, showing illustrations of how individual motifs found in the sampler can be combined in new formations (18, 19):

Indeed, the thing that charms me the most about the JBS is the way that Jane worked so many different stitch variations within each motif, as if to show Alice the range of possibilities! She also added embellishments - seed pearls on her own name, and what appears to be seed beads on one of the large celtic knots. She even included two small motifs in metal threads at the top right corner (V&A, "Physical Description"), which would have been very expensive at the time.

There are motifs that have been unpicked - "frogged" in today's parlance - as if to demonstrate that mistakes happen to everyone! All these careful considerations suggest a very generous spirit, and although the overall effect is a little more crowded than the band samplers more commonly worked today, there are some very interesting designs in the JBS, and it is a captivating work.

And I am obviously not the only one to think so, as I was able to find some works inspired by this sampler online! On Linda Peterson's website, there is a photo of a large blackwork piece worked from the "New Carolingian Modelbook: Counted Embroidery Patterns Before 1600", using motifs adapted from the JBS, particularly the large Celtic knot configuration.

Flickr user alexhaugland has a close-up of the JBS strawberries that appear directly below the Celtic knotwork band in the original, and a photo of a linen shirt embroidered with his own interpretation of the strawberries at the collar and cuffs. In his notes on the shirt photo, he says that the shirt is based on one in the Bath Museum of Costume. I think he probably means the shape of the shirt, not the blackwork design. Although the Bath Museum has a wonderful online archive, the only similar artifact I could find was a plain men's linen undershirt, which was possibly the inspiration, as it too has banded cuffs and a loose flowing fit.

Carol Hanson, also known as Caryl de Trecesson in the historical-recreation Society of Creative Anachronism (SCA), runs the historical resource site Dragonbear. She has a wonderful free project, Jane Bostocke's Strawberries, which is worked in a square, instead of a band as it is in the original. Carol has finished her work as a box-lid insert, but the size and shape would make a good biscornu or pincushion!

The chart is a .jpg image, in colour. Although Carol used unusual specialty padded buttonhole stitches for the strawberries (in keeping with the original), the same area could easily be adapted for simple satin stitches or a cross-stitch fill. A blackwork filling could also be used, or the outline left plain. Like in the original sampler, there are many different stitchy possibilities :) It should be noted that the central flower, the strawberry blossom, was not rendered geometrically like the rest of the pattern, but it could be evened out with a bit of creative finagling, I think!

Speaking of motif designs, I decided to play around with the pattern that first caught my eye when I saw the Jane Bostocke Sampler in Beck's book, what I'm going to call the JBS Acorn Motif, which I've tried to enlarge from the V&A photo (the museum does provide limited high resolution downloads for use with permissions, but I couldn't get the service to work for me, so please excuse the blurriness):

I actually intended to try to chart both of the reddish bands in the center, the top being the Acorn and the second being a floral motif, but without better quality photos I was unable to puzzle out some of the stitches in the second row. I've done two versions of the Acorn Motif - the first is the single motif, and the second is a repeat of that motif, to show how they might be connected. Both images are .jpgs; to downland, click on the photo - the original large upload size should appear in your window. From there, just right click with your mouse and select your save method. If you should encounter any trouble, please let me know!

Here's the JBS Acorn Motif:

You may notice that the bottom of the motif doesn't look exactly like the original - that is because the original stitched band shortened the repeat at the bottom! So I adjusted the chart to make the image symmetrical, as is generally more preferable.

And here is the JBS Acorn Diamond Repeat:

Finally, there are a few short histories which include the JBS that may be of interest: The History of 16th Century Samplers at the Victoria & Albert Museum; the Blackwork: Tudor Embroidery handout from the Guernsey Museum (available through the link in the Education section, 4th link under “Tudor”; look at the sidebar, under Education > Resources (themes)); and the Traditional Embroidered Samplers III: Jane Bostocke's Sampler article at the Posy Tree Blog. Nancy Spies of Wyvern Tales also has an interesting post about the evolution of charted cross-stitch, ending with the JBS which she states was likely worked from printed patterns.

More generally, The History of Samplers article on the Exemplum Samplers antique shop site says that: "The word 'Sampler' is derived from the Latin word 'Exemplum'. The meaning of this word being 'an example to be followed'". I did not know that! And the same site has a very interesting list of Sampler Motif Meanings; for instance, a Bee means “Hope” and a Cat means “Idleness”. I would never have imagined that a Crab symbolizes the “Unconscious”, and I have no idea why that is, LOL! You truly learn something new everyday : )

There are other Sampler Motif Meaning lists on the web (such as those found here and here); none appear to be complete, but many meanings overlap. I imagine that all are a matter of interpretation, and may not be applicable in every circumstance. I didn’t spend a lot of time delving into motif meanings, as truthfully it was the blackwork of the JBS that caught my eye and not its nature as a sampler, but I did discover that most of the motifs Jane used – the Strawberries, the Pomegranates and the Grapes – generally represent religious matters.

And a really neat blog called Worn Through, run by costume conservators, includes a photo of the JBS in its viewing frame in a post about the Victoria & Albert Museum's Textile Studies Galleries, which have closed and are being replaced by a new facility due to open next year.

On a related note, we know that the JBS was worked by Jane for Alice to learn on, but it appears that Alice never added her own stitches to the work. Or did she? A post titled "Taking Samplers At Face Value...Should We?" on the Needleprint blog raises in interesting point – historical samplers are most often assumed to be the work of one stitcher, but since they are heirlooms most often passed down through families, it is possible that later generations added their own stitches to the pieces, as evidenced by the variations in stitch quality that appear on some works. The author suggests that the crudeness of the cross-stitched figures at the top of the JBS does not correlate to the complex blackwork below, which may suggest multiple stitchers.

So! Lots of food for thought, isn't it? It is amazing to me how one single historical needlework sample can yield so much different information and provide so much inspiration! I started off thinking "hmm...that little detail there looks kind of neat" and that snowballed into a whole lot of intriguing research :) What do you think of the Jane Bostocke Sampler? Is there anything about it that appeals to you today, and would you consider using historically inspired motifs in a design of your own?

I'm really curious to hear what you think!

I'm not intending to stitch the acorns myself, but I thought that they might be nice for Autumn, suitable for a quick stitch, perhaps as a small pincushion or needlework cover for a gift. If anyone stitches up one the charts, I'd love to see it finished ;)