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The word 'crewel' is, in fact, simply another word for 'needle'. However, over time, 'crewelwork' has come to refer to those hangings and bed curtains so often seen in country houses, worked in wool on a linen or cotton ground with blue-green foliage rising from rocky mounds, with the occasional exotic flower peeping out between the leaves.
The designs of crewelwork, in fact, illustrate and mirror our trade and interaction with the Indian subcontinent. When the East India Company brought Mughal embroideries back to London in the late 16th and 17th centuries, they were received with great enthusiasm. Those who were not able to purchase the Indian originals, eagerly copied and adapted the designs to English taste and colours. The pinks and reds of the Indian subcontinent gradually made way for the soft greens and blues of the English countryside. The exotic tigers and gazelles of India transformed into stags and hinds, but still perched on the same rocky mounds. In the cool climate of England, these embroideries were ideal to decorate the hangings that kept out the drafts at night around four poster beds. See Lot 9 for an example of two panels from a late 17th century crewelwork bedhanging.
The designs became so much part of the English needlewoman's vocabulary that they continued to develop over the centuries (see Lot 10 for examples of 18th century variations on the theme) well into the 19th and indeed 20th century (see Lot 8), when taste once again moved full circle back towards India in the designs of the 'hippy age'.
TWO CREWELWORK HANGINGS
CIRCA 1900-1920
Details
TWO CREWELWORK HANGINGS
CIRCA 1900-1920
Worked in chain stitch with trailing vines of fruit and flowers in coloured wools on a buff coloured cotton ground
82 x 106 in. (208 x 269 cm.) (2)
CIRCA 1900-1920
Worked in chain stitch with trailing vines of fruit and flowers in coloured wools on a buff coloured cotton ground
82 x 106 in. (208 x 269 cm.) (2)