I'm about to leave on a West Coast cruise for eight days and I thought I'd take along some embroidery. I'm not much of an embroiderer, but it interests me, and I thought it would be fitting to try my hand at embroidering my version of a pocket from the Colonial Williamsburg collection for our trip to Colonial Williamsburg in October. Fitting!
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| American, 1740-1770; This is the only image of the pocket I could find online, from CW's eMuseum, but "Costume Closeup" has much better images, if you have that book. |
I used the pattern from
Costume Close-Up: Clothing Construction and Pattern, 1750-1790
and printed it out close to the actual size noted in the book - 17.5" x 14" . I will be embroidering on a medium weight cotton-linen ground, with your everyday embroidery floss.
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| The pattern from "Costume Closeup" |
I don't intend to follow the color scheme of the original pocket, but to instead just go as it seems right, and try some of the techniques in
18th Century Embroidery Techniques
. Here's another pocket from Colonial Williamsburg's collection, with more striking colors:
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| American, 1740-1760 |
The original pocket is bound in printed cotton bindings, but I love the look of petersham in a contrasting color...but first I have to get through all the embroidery!
