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Category: 15th century
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This month, we will examine medieval goldwork from Tuscany, Italy. I was fortunate enough to see many of these pieces when they were exhibited at Castello Buonconsiglio in 2019. The series of blog posts is also in preparation for a trip to Tuscany that my husband and I hope to make next month. We’ll kick…
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By now, you probably know that chasing embroidered medieval vestments is kinda my thing :). Although I am fortunate enough to be able to travel regularly, a lot of my research happens behind a computer screen. Trailing through publications, especially the literature references, is how I find new-to-me pieces. And related information to these pieces.…
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In the 80s, we had an art historian in the Netherlands who started to systematically trawl through historical records to find late medieval and early modern embroiderers and embroidery guilds. She published a couple of great articles on the topic. However, the large overview publication she promised in her 1987 article never saw the light…
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Last week, we looked at five different embroidered versions of the same Adoration of the Magi design. By changing materials and embroidery techniques, these late 15th and early 16th century embroideries look quite different from each other. The scene was part of four chasubles and a loose chasuble cross. But what about the other scenes…
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If you have followed this blog for a while, you already know that medieval goldwork embroidery was mass-produced. The designs were used more than once, sometimes even on the same vestment. Survived have mainly the simpler single-figure orphreys or the, possibly block-printed, naive embroidered scenes from Germany. But that’s not all. Even very complex scenes…
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German medieval embroideries are often characterised by a composite thread not seen elsewhere: gold gimp. This is a relatively thick piece of string wrapped with a thin thread of membrane gold (gilt animal gut wrapped around a linen core). Was this a ready-made thread? Did the embroiderers make the thread themselves? Is it either pre-made or made…
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This blog post is taking way longer to write than I intended. Sorry, I fell down a rabbit hole. And then another one :). I will find myself in both holes in the state library in Munich on Friday. What happened? As always, I think I have seen the same embroidery before, but when I…
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Last week, Sabine Ullrich, curator of the Kulturhistorisches Museum Magdeburg, invited me to view a chasuble cross in storage. To my delight, Sabine came up with a few additional pieces for me to study. While there are currently no medieval embroideries on display in the museum, textile enthusiasts should visit as there are beautiful late-medieval and 16th-century tapestries on permanent display.…
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This week, I have a goldwork embroidery tutorial for you inspired by a late 15th-century embroidered chasuble kept in the Domschatz of Fritzlar. It has these lovely textured bands or borders between the individual orphreys. The border is made by couching gold threads and coloured silks over string padding. It seems to be a very…