#laid work

These small projects have been completed for a stall my embroidery group will hold in April ... stumpwork, metal thread, laidwork, beading

Panel of laid work embroidery, worked by Rachel Kay Shuttleworth in 1921.

This panel of embroidery is worked in a technique known as laid work where long stitches are laid down first to fill in the shapes and then secured with smaller couching stitches. It was worked by the collection’s founder, Rachel Kay Shuttleworth, as a present for her parents Ughtred and Blanche on their golden wedding anniversary in 1921. In keeping with the ‘golden’ theme Rachel chose cloth of gold for the background fabric and had it framed in an ornate gilt frame made by the Medici Society.

The design of a vase, exotic flowers and a pair of peacocks was sketched out by Rachel’s cousin Valerie, Lady North and is taken from one of the carved & pierced parapets up in the galleries of St Marks Cathedral, Venice.

Rachel chose the laid work technique for this piece as it allows large areas to be covered relatively quickly. It was also a technique favoured by Lady North. The embroidery uses many colours of silk floss thread that Rachel arranged carefully to create beautiful gradients. In her notes about the piece, written many years later, she stated that “when [I] embd this, the range of Pearsall Stout Floss silks was wide & numbered some 400 shades - now in 1965 - there are only some 40 - so this cannot be reproduced”. The embroidery is further embellished with gold metal threads and iridescent beetle wings on the peacocks’ tails.