This is the first dedicated book to concentrate on textiles as a major commodity, and primary indicator of status, wealth and identity in Indian Ocean regions. The volume considers the importance of trade, and the transformation of the meaning of objects as they move between different cultures; it also addresses issues of gender, ethnic and religious identity, and economic status. The book covers a broad geographic range from East Africa to South-East Asia, and references a number of disciplines such as anthropology, art history and history. This volume is timely, as both the social sciences and historical studies have developed a new interest in material culture.

This is a fascinating insight into the living history of Africa. African textiles are patterned with stories that range far beyond the time of the creation or the lifetime of their creator. In Africa, cloth is used to commemorate important events, people or political struggles that in other parts of the world might be recorded in writing, or marked by a plaque or monument. This beautifully illustrated book deciphers these hidden stories, whilst also revealing the relevance of African textiles today, exploring how the dynamic traditions in African cloth-making have provided inspiration for the continent's foremost contemporary artists and photographers. Africa's long engagement with the peoples of the Mediterranean and the islands of the Atlantic and Indian Oceans provides a story of change and continuity, showing how ideas, techniques, materials and markets have adapted and flourished. Accompanied by 200 stunning illustrations revealing the rich variety of textile traditions throughout Africa, this new work showcases some of the world's finest examples of textile arts.

The Grammar of Pattern describes characteristics of textile and other surface patterns, and identifies, illustrates, and reviews a wide range of pattern types including spotted, striped, checked, tessellating and other types of all-over patterns with original drawings and images. This book includes original black-and-white line drawings and color images. The modular nature of patterns is explored, and attention is focused on the vast diversity of pattern types which can emerge from a small inventory of components. The book features material that is easily accessible with obvious mathematical content kept to a minimum and offers fresh perspectives on the nature of tessellating and other all-over patterns. This book serves as an effective practical guide for both students and professionals. Select sample exercises and student assignments are included, making this an ideal course text for teachers engaged across the full range of design education.

A Visual Dictionary of Decorative and Domestic Arts provides a common and unambiguous vocabulary for the parts of handcrafted decorative, domestic, and artistic items. Terminology for a broad array of object types is presented alongside original 3D illustrations that facilitate objective referencing. The reference enhances learning, labeling, and discussing various craft items in great physical detail. Sixty-four 3D graphic illustrations provide an effective visual format for identifying the vocabulary/location of the parts on individual objects. The dictionary is divided into five major sections: -Decorative Objects such as a basket, jar/jug, flatware -Domestic Furnishings such as a bed with bedding, upholstered chairs, tables -Artistic Works and Tools such as books, prints, paintings, photographs, and sculpture -Jewelry Adornment Items such as earrings, necklaces, pins, and watches -Accessory Articles such as a hat, pipe, comb, and fan The thoroughness of the annotations makes this volume an essential tool for museum curators and conservators, librarians, connoisseurs, buyers and dealers; artists and crafts persons, collectors, designers, registrars and anyone with an interest in visual history.

Gloriously pieced together, much like the fine garments it portrays, this colourful volume takes the reader on an international tour of indigo-coloured textiles, presenting a huge swathe of remarkable clothing, people and fabric. Catherine Legrand, who has spent over twenty years travelling and researching the subject, has a deep knowledge of the ancient techniques, patterns and clothing traditions that characterize ethnic textile design, knowledge that she deploys to great effect in seven chapters exploring the production of Indigo textiles throughout America, China, India, Africa, Central Asia, Japan and Laos/Vietnam, and the men and women behind them. This profusely illustrated photographic survey features more than 500 photographs, faithfully laid out to reproduce Catherine's actual travel notebooks, and is completed by specially commissioned drawings that provide close-ups on patterns and clothes.

Among the great designers at Herman Miller in the 1950s and 1960s, Alexander Girard enhanced Eames' and Nelson's furniture with innovative textiles. As head of Herman Miller's Textile Division since it was formed in 1952, he designed some of the most colorful and exciting fabrics available anywhere. He also designed the 25-piece Girard Group of modern furniture, and the 40-item series of Environmental Enrichment Panels for Action Office 2. Girard's unmatched folk art collection adorned Herman Miller buildings, filled their Textiles & Objects Shop in New York, and over 100,000 items made up the famous Girard Foundation. His acclaimed work as an interior designer and architect and his remarkable textiles for Herman Miller make Girard one of the legendary designers of the twentieth century. With over 400 mostly color photographs of his textile and wallpaper designs, all of the EE panels and furniture, plus detailed text, timeline, and an updated value guide, this book is a comprehensive view of Girard's work at Herman Miller, and a must for anyone interested in mid-century design of textiles, interiors, or graphics.

Wallpaper's spread across trades, class and gender is charted in this first full-length study of the material's use in Britain during the long eighteenth century. It examines the types of wallpaper that were designed and produced and the interior spaces it occupied, from the country house to the homes of prosperous townsfolk and gentry, showing that wallpaper was hung by Earls and merchants as well as by aristocratic women. Drawing on a wide range of little known examples of interior schemes and surviving wallpapers, together with unpublished evidence from archives including letters and bills, it charts wallpaper's evolution across the century from cheap textile imitation to innovative new decorative material. Wallpaper's growth is considered not in terms of chronology, but rather alongside the categories used by eighteenth-century tradesmen and consumers, from plains to flocks, from China papers to papier mache and from stucco papers to materials for creating print rooms. It ends by assessing the ways in which eighteenth-century wallpaper was used to create historicist interiors in the twentieth century. Including a wide range of illustrations, many in colour, the book will be of interest to historians of material culture and design, scholars of art and architectural history as well as practicing designers and those interested in the historic interior.

A general introduction for artists and makers looking to incorporate textiles and textiles techniques into their work. This book introduces you to basic textile techniques and encourages you to experiment with your chosen medium to create your own piece of work. Works by featured artists and designers give you plenty of inspiration, with tips to achieve similar styles and effects. Each section also includes many stimulating ideas for source and reference material. Through colourful images and detail instructions, learn techniques such as transferring images onto fabric, creating fabrics, wireframe construction, 3D wire construction, using a heat tool, materials manipulation, adapting traditional techniques as well as joining, seaming, bonding, layering, mould-making, casting and forming.

The design revolutions of the early 20th century were woven into the very fabric of the carpets and rugs of that era. Carpets of the Art Deco Era, previously published as Art Deco and Modernist Carpets and now reissued in PLC, is the first in-depth history on the subject. It charts the evolution of carpet design out of the floral effusions of the Victorian salons and into the angular elegance of Art Deco and bold abstraction of Modernism popularized by the machine age. Such artists and designers as Picasso, Poiret, Gray, Delaunay, Matisse, Klee, and many more advanced the designs going on underfoot, making these rugs extremely collectible artworks in their own right. Generously sized and beautifully illustrated with over 250 colour photographs, here are Art Deco carpets at their most glorious.

Needle Work: Stitched Illustrations is a lavishly illustrated volume that explores the growing trend in textile-based art and illustration. The works of each featured artist are showcased with full-page illustrations, alongside a brief biography that examines their work, inspiration, and artistic vision.

"Order and Disorder" looks at the cross-cultural context and collaborative nature of Aligheiero Boetti's iconic artworks. The original, often large-scale works in his series Mappe (Maps), Tutto (Everything), and "squared word" were created in needle and thread by women in Afghanistan and in Pakistani refugee camps following the Soviet invasion in 1979, under the direction of Boetti (1940-1994).

Photographs of the artworks and of Afghan women embroidering them are accompanied by examples of embroidered garments and textiles made by Afghanistan's diverse peoples. Such items reveal the country's complex demography and illustrate the kinds of embroideries that were widely traded during the years that Boetti visited.

Christopher G. Bennett is the Dean's Postdoctoral Fellow in Contemporary Art at the University of Delaware. Roy Hamilton is senior curator of Asian and Pacific Collections at the Fowler Museum at UCLA. Alma Ruiz is a senior curator at the Museum of Contemporary Art Los Angeles. Photographer Randi Malkin Steinberger collaborated with Alighiero Boetti on two previous books, "Accunto Pantheon" and "Boetti by Afghan People."

Take a close-up look at far-out fabric designs from the 1960s in full, cool colors. All the orange, hot pink, and sky blue the era's most fertile imaginations could conjure. Featured are more than 300 striking swatches from top couture houses in Paris and Milan, bold flower prints on silk, cotton, and the acetates and polyesters that helped shape fashion's most eye-popping era.

This second edition of 'Textile Conservator's Manual', now revised and available in paperback, provides an in-depth review of the current practice, ethics and materials used in textile conservation. Concentrating on decorative art objects from the major cultures, the book gives practical instruction and a wide variety of case histories. While the format has been simplified, the text has been expanded and updated to include changes bought about by recent developments in the conservation of material. This new information will increase the reader's ability to interpret signs of ageing and past activity on the object. New case histories in Part Two represent major investigations into the technical history. A basis is provided from which to develop practical skills, taking into account the needs of the object, its essential characteristics of appearance and, above all, its structure. The book covers a wide range of decorative objects, from a fragment of linen 4000 years old to a theatrical backcloth of the twentieth century. This book is practical and thought-provoking, not only about what is being done and how, but also why.

Timor has been a divided island at least since the seventeenth century when Dutch and Portuguese colonial empires competed for its control. Despite this fragmentation, the weaving of cloth has remained intimately linked to the cultural history of the Timorese peoples as a whole. Handwoven cotton garments serve as markers of identity and nurture social relationships when they are exchanged. Women in Timor weave an impressive variety of cloth, routinely combining more weaving techniques than any other region of Southeast Asia. This technical prowess and diversity of design make weaving the most important form of artistic expression in Timor and allow groups as small as individual families to proclaim their unique heritage. Independence for Timor-Leste (East Timor) in 2002 - following invasion by Indonesia and years of violent warfare (1975-1999) - brought with it more stable conditions and improved access for researchers. Textiles of Timor, Island in the Woven Sea brings together for the first time woven works from all parts of the island, demonstrating that the textile arts form a common foundation uniting Timor's diverse peoples despite the painful history of the country's division.

A colourfully illustrated guide to the traditional and contemporary textile skills of hooking, prodding, punching and tufting, to fire your imagination, and to discover ideas for eco-friendly crafting. - Contains 20 vibrant step-by-step projects exploring playful design and quirky creativity, including rugs, cushions, bags and personal accessories. - Conserves resources through imaginative re-use of all kinds of materials - from recycled clothing, food packaging and plastics, to junk jewellery and surplus yarn. - Includes examples of community projects and an inspirational gallery of work by notable artists from around the world.

This pictorial survey is arranged visually with a focus on design, particularly color and pattern. The fabric is contemporary, most made of cotton primarily in Africa commercially, and many designs are printed adaptations of traditional African woven textiles. The designs can serve as a reference and inspiration to artists and designers of fabric and fashion. There are complex and abstract patterns, florals, pictorials, animal and figural themes.

Textiles are central to our lives and are at the heart of the world's largest industries. In recent years there has been a dynamic shift in attitudes toward textiles, fuelled in part by explosive developments in technology. While textiles have always retained roots in craft and industry, the discipline now embraces a much wider range of practices. Innovations in the industry demand a fresh approach to the subject, which this comprehensive introduction ably supplies. Taking as their starting point the very meaning of textiles, Gale and Kaur go on to show the astonishing range of opportunities for careers in the field, from the creative (artists, craftspeople and designers) to the social and industrial, to the commercial and associated practices (buyers, journalists, researchers and scientists). The Textile Book takes us behind the scenes with professionals to reveal what various jobs involve, what influences decision makers, and how their decisions affect what we buy next season. What happens to clothes before they reach the shops? What determines the 'must have' item? How can recycled bottles be transformed into silk-like yarns? These and many other questions are explored to show the diversity that makes up the contemporary global textile scene. Woven, printed, embroidered, knitted -- textiles are pivotal to the everyday experience of people in all parts of the world. This wide-ranging and informative book conveys the excitement and new challenges textiles represent and is essential reading for anyone working with, studying or simply interested in textiles.

A comprehensive study of walking canes from around the world, dating from the distant past to the modern-day. The book presents a historical context on both practical and ceremonial usage. At the same time, specially shot pictures showcase the celebrated A&D Collection of canes, while enlightening prose demonstrates the cane's enduring relevance to society. More than just a mobility aid, the cane has held numerous offices of significance. From the staff of the legendary Monkey King in the classic Chinese Journey to the West, or the stylised crosiers carried by high-ranking prelates from the Roman Catholic church, to the truncheon wielded by Mr Punch in puppet shows, canes are embedded in the culture of almost every country around the globe. Roving the map with one hand and thumbing through history books with the other, A Virtual History of Walking Canes and Sticks seeks not only to introduce the collector to the diverse wealth of canes available but also to entertain the casual reader. Intermingled with over 800 full-colour pictures are descriptions of gadget canes for tradesmen, squirting canes for pranksters, and glamorous Art Nouveau canes for the dapper gentlemen of the '20s. Informative and meticulously researched, this book paves an accessible route into a niche subject while paying homage to our ongoing relationship with canes. This story stretches back as far as history itself.

This book explores interconnections between high literary modernism and the revolution in dress design of the early twentieth century. During this time, new and «liberated» lifestyles created a bond among figures as diverse as writers and fashion editors, painters and art critics, photographers and models, dancers and economists – all of whom were in different ways looking at new «inventive clothes» (Vreeland) as life experiences. Starting points of the research are Pirandello’s One, no one, and one hundred thousand, where the protagonist’s disowning of his own image in the mirror ignites a tragedy, and Roger Fry’s essays on the resuscitation of Victorianism at the end of the First World War, where the phantasmagoria of time is identified as the basis for modern illusion. Each chapter in the book explores a different facet of the same topic: the distance between self and image as the dispenser or destroyer of enchantment. This issue was actively pursued by philosophers (Benjamin), writers (Woolf, Mansfield, Fitzgerald), photographers (Man Ray, Cecil Beaton) and fashion critics (Vreeland). The evolution in fashion editing was meanwhile instructing the sophisticated readers of Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar in the art of contemplating their own reflections in the mirror and seeing in them exactly what they wanted to see. The Natasha of the title is Tolstoy’s heroine, a secret spring of creative energy for Katherine Mansfield, and the source of one of Diana Vreeland’s most perceptive insights into the nature of fashion.

Paisley textile designs are organized into a sweeping visual survey, from orderly foulard patterns to elaborate borders, from experimental media to ornate florals; this book delves into printed and woven fabrics alike. More than 550 full-color photographs of paisley designs provide an invaluable optical reference of variations that span more than five decades of fabric design, including French and Italian couture fabrics. It is the most comprehensive pictorial guide produced on the subject.

Featuring more than 500 photos and maps, this is the first comprehensive, research-based history of Navajo weavings with imagery inspired by tribal sacred practices. These Yei, Yeibichai, and sandpainting textiles have been the most sought after by collectors and the least studied by scholars. In spite of their iconography, they never served a ceremonial function. They were created by Navajo women at the instigation of Anglo traders, for sale to wealthy collectors willing to pay premium prices for their perceived spiritual symbolism. This book describes the historical and artistic development of the genre from its controversial emergence around 1900, to the 1920-1940 period of intense creativity, and concluding with the contemporary search for innovative patterns. Never-before-published weavings, detailed annotations, and an extensive bibliography make this an invaluable reference for scholars and collectors, and a fascinating exploration for all who are interested in the Southwest and its native cultures.

Extensively illustrated, this is the first accessible publication on the history of tapestry in over two decades. Woven with dazzling images from history, mythology and the natural world, and breath-taking in their craftsmanship, tapestries were among the most valuable and high-status works of art available in Europe from the medieval period to the end of the eighteenth century. Over 600 historic examples hang in National Trust properties in England and Wales - the largest collection in the UK. This beautifully illustrated study by tapestry expert Helen Wyld, in association with the National Trust, offers new insights into these works, from the complex themes embedded in their imagery, to long-forgotten practices of sacred significance and ritual use. The range of historical, mythological and pastoral themes that recur across the centuries is explored, while the importance of the 'revival' of tapestry from the late nineteenth century is considered in detail for the first time. Although focussed on the National Trust's collection, this book offers a fresh perspective on the history of tapestry across Europe. Both the tapestry specialist and the keen art-history enthusiast can find a wealth of information here about woven wall hangings and furnishings, including methods of production, purchase and distribution, evolving techniques and technologies, the changing trends of subject matter across time, and how tapestries have been collected, used and displayed in British country houses across the centuries.

Looking through the pages of Fun Fabrics of the 50s will transport you back to the days of Beaver Cleaver shirt plaids, cowboy heroes flannel pajamas, early American rec room drapery, splashy lounge chair tropical blooms, housewives' duster florals, and festive south-of-the-border kitchen curtains. The decade's fascination with geometric shapes, bright colors and "foreign" motifs results in interesting, sometimes strange, combinations of design. For designers and 50s fanatics alike, this full-color book offers hundreds of fabric styles that reflect an innocent era.

Tweed is one of Scotland's great gifts to the world. Woven into every strand of this most authentic and rugged of cloths is an extraordinary heritage of innovation and creativity. The Art of Tweed explores the landscapes, textures and patterns of this glorious fabric. From the rolling hills of Scotland's country estates to the rhythmic clatter of looms in our last-surviving mills. From artisan weavers on the Isle of Harris to the high fashion of international catwalks and urban designers reimagining tweed for the streets. Here is a story of romance, nostalgia, sustainability and style - of an effortlessly versatile cloth and its unique place in our lives. Whether fashioned into a flat cap or tailored into a cape, the story of tweed is a story to be shared.