Tablet weaving: practice run part II

Thanks for all your comments on my SOS post! This is my second attempt, in pink and white silk (1200 dernier) from Devere Yarns. This silk gives a very smooth, soft and shiny braid :-). The braid is about 1 cm in width. In the upper row, you can clearly see the point where I reversed the directions of the tablets. It's not so obvious as in my first attempt, but I'm not sure whether I like it: it really disrupts the smooth surface... I also found it difficult to maintain the tension of the weft. I guess that in my next attempt, I have to pull the weft a little tighter, because now it really shows at the edges.

(A reenactors dilemma: reversing the tablets is done in the original work, but the braid looks much better without it. To go for "authentic" or to go for "beautiful"? I'm inclined to go for beautiful...)

I want to use this type of braid to make some 14th century garters. (I've put my embroidery projects on hold and I'm currently focusing on a set of ca. 1370 clothes. )

You can find a picture of the original in

Crowfoot, E., Pritchard, F., & Staniland, K., Textiles and Clothing c. 1150-c. 1450. Medieval Finds from Excavations in London, 4. London: The Boydell Press, p 133 braid C.

A pattern of this braid can be found here.

Recommended reading: Ecclesiastical Pomp and Aristocratic Circumstance

I just added a new book to my collection, Nancy Spies, Ecclesiastical Pomp and Aristocratic Circumstance: A thousand years of brocaded tablet woven bands. Nancy Spies tried to track and describe as much brocaded tablet woven bands as possible from the period 600-1600 (in Europe). The resulting book is a gem which offers a wealth of data.

The book consist of two parts and three appendices. In the first part, Spies describes the historical background of (brocaded) tablet weaving. She covers issues such as production, use, techniques, designs and tools. The second part is an amazing “DIY” craft manual: she describes how to weave brocaded bands (tips, tricks and trouble-shooting included) and she presents pattern draughts of a large number of bands from different museum collections, together with technical and bibliographical data of each band.

Appendix A present a list of bands by function in chronological order, very useful if you want to know more about e.g. brocaded bands used in 14^th century relic pouches. Appendix B explains double-faced 3/1 broken twill, and Appendix C is a catalogue of bands listed by country, city and museum.

The book concludes with an extensive, annotated bibliography, which was put on-line by Weavershand.

The part of the book I'm reading currently deals with the analysis of metal threads (pp. 60-65). Spies discusses some really interesting references (see bibliography above), I hope I can find some of them :-).

A few posts ago, we discussed gold work on leather, and whether it was used on shoes ( I'd really love to have golden shoes, too bad that's not historically accurate for a 14^th century craftswoman...). On p. 32, Spies shows a drawing of the shoes of King Philip of Swabia (1198-1208) “trimmed with brocaded tabletwoven bands sewn together with a looped stitch using gold threads.” Apparently, it could be done, if you were very rich...

Tablet weaving SOS

I'm trying to practice some tablet weaving, using, among others, the great tutorial from string page here.

I'm doing a simplified trial run (sszzss) in thick cotton of the 14th century striped braid described here: http://www.cs.vassar.edu/~capriest/3recipes.html

There is something I'm doing wrong, but I don't know how to correct it.

Each time I turn the tablets in reverse direction (e.g. 4 turns backward and then 4 turns forward), the weft shows through the surface. This happens only at the point where I reverse the tablets from one direction to another. (Each of my turns is one quarter of the tablet, so in 4 turns, I'm in "home position" again.) You can see this happening in the white stripe left of the pencil, where the red weft thread is visible in a way that shouldn't be...



I know the weft should not be showing, but I don't know what I'm doing wrong. If anyone knows how to solve this problem, please let me know :-)

Rogier van der Weyden, embroidered pillows?

Yesterday I visited the Rogier van der Weyden Exhibition in Leuven, Belgium. It was interesting, with some beautiful paintings, scuplture and embroidery.

This blogpost is called embroidered pillows, because my attention was drawn by a detail from The seven sacraments (ca 1440-1445). In the left corner of the painting, where the 7th sacrament is depicted, a dying man lies in bed on a pile of pillows. When I looked at it closely, I thought that maybe the seams of these pillows were embroidered with some kind of interlacing stitch. Unfortunately, the picture of this painting in the Web Gallery of Art is not very detailed:

Seven Sacraments (right wing)

1445-50
Oil on oak panel, 119 x 63 cm
Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, Antwerp

This type of pillow appears again in another painting by (the workshop of?) Van der Weyden: the Madonna of the dyptich of Jean the Gros. (this painting is not part of the exhibition). This time, the on-line picture is more detailed:

Portrait Diptych of Jean de Gros (left wing)

1450s
Oil on oak panel, 36 x 27 cm
Musée des Beaux-Arts, Tournai

all images from: http://www.wga.hu/

Interlacing stitches were used to sew pieces of linen fabric together in a decorative way. There are some examples of tablecloths, and of course the cap of St Birgitte.

I wonder whether these type of stitches were also used for pillow cases? If you know more about this, please let us know!

Catherine’s world: devotion, demons and daily life in the 15th century

Museum Valkhof in Nijmegen (The Netherlands) presents an exhibition about Catherine of Cleves: Catherine’s world: devotion, demons and daily life in the 15th century.

Read more about it here.

The highlights of the exhibition are the pages of the famous Hours of Catherine of Cleves (c. 1440) from The Morgan Library & Museum in New York, which will be displayed separately. This is a unique opportunity to see these beautiful miniatures from up close :-)

The miniatures are rich in detail, for example the one below in which Catherine gives money to the poor. It's difficult to discern in this picture, but close-ups of this folio show that she's got a beautiful blue and gold/yellow alms pouch with three tassels, also in blue and gold/yellow. It also seems to have to golden/yellow knops at the sides.

image from codart.nl

Kunera: a database of medieval badges and ampullae

Kunera is a database dedicated to the study of medieval badges and ampullae. In their own words:

"The website Kunera offers access to over 15.000 badges and ampullae of religious and profane subjects. The pilgrimage sites and the sites where the objects were found are mapped out visualizing the dissemination of the objects and the travel routes at a single glance."

You can find the database here: http://www.kunera.nl/

I write about this, because I really like the badges in the form of different types of pouches from circa 1375-1425. Search for "beurs" or"purse" and you'll find lovely badges such as this one (object 00818):

Quick update from Isis

Hello dear readers!

These past months, I haven't been able to write on this blog, for which I am truly sorry.

I got a bit of a thesis whiplash, so to say :) Mr. B. has moved so I've been busy helping out with renovating and decorating the new house. I went on vacation for three lovely weeks (to France and Switserland). I visited two evens recently, one in Germany and one in Holland. I started a new study: Textile conservation and restoration, in Antwerp. My phd. proposal is slowly getting shape.

But alas, I have not made any progress on getting my thesis published yet. One: step in the right direction: before the end of this week I'm going to buy a laptop, this means I can work during long hours of train traveling! Yay :)

Museum Mayer van den Bergh

This week I visited the museum Mayer van den Bergh in Antwerp, Belgium. It's a small, charming museum with an interesting collection of medieval art: embroidery (opus anglicanum), sculpture (wood, ivory) and paintings.

I really liked this panel from circa 1400, because of the colors and details such as the apron and the shoes. (read more about it here, go to "collections" and then "Antwerp-Baltimore")

The picture below and more nativity scenes can be found here. Too bad I can't read it, but the pictures are interesting!

Gold thread used in backstitch?

Note: please read the comments to this post for new insights

Bertus from Deventer Burgerscap told me about this nice picture of a 15th century leather pouch, embroidered in gold thread:

http://www.hermann-historica.de/auktion/hhm58.pl?f=NR&c=93474&t=temartic_A_GB&db=kat58_a.txt


The embroidery used to decorate the pouch raises some very interesting questions: Is gold thread used in techniques other than couched work, i.e. techniques in which the thread disappears at the back of the work, such as brick stitch or backstitch? If so, then how is this achieved?

Usually, there are two arguments against the use of gold thread in techniques other than couched work:
1)gold thread is too expensive to be used at the back of a work, where it will not be seen
2)gold thread is not flexible enough to be used in stitches such as backstitch or brick stitch.

Still, it appears to me that in some rare cases, gold thread is used in techniques which involve sewing the thread through the fabric. The pouch above, for example, seems to be embroidered in backstitch rather than couched work.

Other examples , complete with close up pictures, of this particular use of gold thread can be found here:

Takacs, I. (2006), Sigismundus Rex et Imperator. Kunst und Kultur zur Zeit Sigismunds von Luxumburg 1387-1437., J.P. Himmer, Augsburg p 96 embroidered cloth from ca 1830 with unknown purpose/function

Tongeren, Basiliek O.L. Vrouw Geboorte. I Textiel. (1988), Leuven: Peeters. On the cover is a close up from a pouch dating from ca 1300.
See also Isis' documentation on this pouch here: http://www.paperflowergirl.com/patroon2web.pdf


It would be nice to know more about this (rare) use of gold thread. If anyone knows more about it, please let us know!

BTW: the leather pouch is for sale. Please let me know if one of you has bought it! (it's too expensive for me ...)