| Canvaswork is the term referring to 16th century
needlework done on canvas Today, we refer to canvaswork as "needlepoint",
but this is an American description. If you used the term needlepoint
during the Middle Ages, you would be referring to lacemaking
with a needle. Like the word embroidery, canvaswork is
often confused with the word tapestry, which refers to
a woven design. Perhaps that confusion stems from the fact that
Elizabethan needleworkers were copying European pictorial tapestry
designs onto canvas. Flemish woven tapestries, especially those
depicting human figures and those skillfully woven with silk
and metal threads, were expensive, admired, and coveted.
Further inspired by the colorful carpets coming out of Turkey
and the printing of herbals and bestiaries, Elizabethan England
quickly adopted canvaswork. Not only was it used to train young
girls in needlework, but also to decorate great manors. Inside
these manors, canvaswork decorated bed hangings, wall hangings,
bed canopies, head cloths, curtains, bed testers, kneeling pillows,
seat cushions, table carpets and cupboard cloths. Keep in mind
that there were more hard benches than upholstered chairs in
Elizabethan England, and the bedroom was in and of itself a
state chamber in a noble's home. So warmth, grandeur and comfort
were major household concerns of the wealthy that inspired the
production of such canvaswork.
Canvas during the Middle Ages was more akin to a soft linen
fabric, than the mesh canvas we use today in needlepoint. An
excellent photo of this evenweave linen fabric is shown on Page
30 of Mary Gostelow's The Complete Guide to Needlework Techniques
and Materials. Often this canvas was so fine that several
hundred stitches could be worked per square inch with silk thread
(e.g., Bradford Table Carpet). Linen canvas (AKA lynnen cloth)
has been described in books as "heavy", "stout", or "coarse",
although it was made from the superior hemp plant (as opposed
to flax) and was not a rough textured cloth.
The late 16th c. wall hanging known as the Banquet of Lucretia
was worked on "stout" linen using both woolen and silk threads
in tent stitch, the basic stitch of canvaswork. The wool stitches
were worked in colors of "three blues, three creams, three greens,
two reds, brown, light sepia, lilac and black" The silk threads
used were "light blue, green, white and yellow." Colors such
as pale orange and shades of pink, blue-green and yellow were
not uncommon in canvaswork. By using silk thread, the linen
canvas could be worked in brilliant colors, in a variety of
shades, and in very minute tent stitch, referred to as petit
point by the French. Metal thread was used for detailing and
for outlining as found couched around needlework slips.
Slips was the 16th century term for flowers worked
in silk or wool (mostly tent stitch) and then cut from the linen
canvas and applied to another fabric, often velvet. Santina
Levey noted in her study of the Hardwick Hall textiles that
Mary Queen of Scots outlined her slips with black stitches before
she filled in the colors. Besides flowers, insects (worms, butterflies,
dragonflies, etc.) and animals (many grotesque and not realistic)
were lifted from the popular bestiaries and engravings and copied
onto the canvas.
It was also not uncommon to find human figures needleworked
on canvas and then cut out and applied to such luxurious fabrics
as velvet. This "cut-and-apply" method created a rich effect
with the silk and metal thread against the velvet. Secondly,
it was much easier and quicker to needlework linen then directly
on velvet. The cushion known as "Fancie of a Fowler" serves
as a fine example of this process, as well as a study of late
16th c. Elizabethan costuming. The professionally worked figures
were done in silk and metal thread featuring Bess of Hardwick
and members of her family, mostly in tent stitch and upright
gobelin stitches. The figures, once worked, were then cut out
and applied to purple velvet. It was also not unusual to find
such "cut-and-applied" canvaswork combined on the same ground
fabric with appliqued fabric work and other surface embroidery
techniques.
No different than earlier professional embroideries, craftsman
skilled in painting and design often created the designs for
the canvas and then left it to the professional embroiderers
to do the needlework. Although canvaswork was not out of the
framework of being worked by amateurs, the mere size of some
pieces and the detailed design and fineness of stitches indicate
that professional craftsman and embroiderers were employed.
Referred to as needlework rather than embroidery, 16th c. canvaswork
employed a repertoire of various stitches, starting with the
turkey-work stitch (not to be confused with carpets imported
from Turkey). This early canvaswork stitch was used to imitate
the Middle Eastern method of making carpets. Instead of using
the fingers to twist knots, the English used a needle on canvas
by "making a series of loops, securing each one as you went
along, with a form of back stitch, and then clipping the whole
thing afterward to form a pile."
Inherently strong, the tent stitch was used to imitate
woven tapestry by working it across each intersection of the
canvas. Tent stitch, which first appeared in the 13th c. in
combination with other stitches, looks like half of a cross-stitch
and both stitches are excellent choices for working designs
on seat cushions, kneeling pillows, etc. Even when these stitches
were worked in a variety of directions on the same piece, they
proved quite effective for the sake of appearance.
Since the evenweave linen ground for canvaswork is completely
covered, other "coverage stitches" to use include upright
gobelin or brick, long-armed cross stitch
and plait or plaited braid. Running, stem, satin
and sometimes even chain stitch are good detail stitches for
canvaswork. See diagrams for the gobelin, brick, long-armed
cross stitch and plaited stitch. The Florentine or
Bargello stitch was also a popular canvaswork style of
the Renaissance, but we will save that technique for another
article.
It is a mistake for needleworkers to think that the counted,
geometric stitches named above and used in 16th c. canvaswork
were not used earlier. As Erica Wilson notes in her Embroidery
Book, an altar frontal done 300 years earlier in Germany
(formerly Saxony) was embroidered on coarse linen using silk
threads and counted, geometric stitches. She also noted that
on the Hildesheim Cope, the entire linen was worked in a brick
stitch. Schuette & Müller-Christensen feature in their
embroidery book a color plate (#VI) of the late 12th c. Bell
Chasuble worked mostly in long-armed cross stitch.
Worsted wool thread (known as crewel in the Middle
Ages) was used for canvaswork in the 16th century. Today, needleworkers
can purchase: (1) Paternayan's Persian wool - 3 stranded, easily
divided, usually use 2 strands for canvaswork, easiest to work
in 30 inch lengths; (2) DMC Medici and Broider Wul are both
single-stranded 100% virgin wool in muted shades. The Broider
Wul is hand-dyed. You can't use lengths much longer than 18
inches, frays easily, usually use 2 strands for canvaswork;
and (3) DMC or Anchor Tapestry wool - single thread, larger
in diameter, doesn't tangle, nice colors.
Silk threads that today's needleworkers can purchase
include: (1) Soie d'Alger - 7 stranded, divisible, and available
in almost 600 colors; (2) Soie Gobelin - 2 ply twisted filament
silk, and (3) Trebizond Twisted Silk - sold in 10 meter spools,
perfect for tent stitch on 18-mesh canvas.
Note: Order the full amount of thread needed to
complete a project so the entire "dye-lot" of that color matches.
Experiment with threads to find the correct number of strands
that will pass through the canvas easily without fraying but
providing adequate coverage of the canvas itself.
100% linen canvas can be purchased today and is available
in 13 or 17 mesh. Since such linen canvas cloth or even the
imported evenweave linens can be quite expensive ranging from
$25 per yard on up, most people experimenting with canvaswork
tend to purchase one of the following types of cotton canvas:
(1) Mono needlepoint canvas - single thread canvas available
in 10, 12, 13, 14, 16 or 18 mesh, OR (2) Penelope canvas
- double threaded, available in same mesh sizes as mono canvas,
used for finer detail and durability. Both Mono and Penelope
canvas are measured in terms of mesh sizeSnumber of stitched
threads per inch, whereas imported linen is measured in terms
of counted threads per inch (hence, 14 count, 18 count, etc.).
For canvaswork, we use tapestry needles which have
blunted points, long enlarged eyes, and come in sizes ranging
from 13 to 26 but most likely will be found in sizes 22, 24
and 26. You may need the smaller size blunt needles if you are
working with silk or any passing metal threads.
Frames, stretcher bars or hoops are not a requirement
for doing canvaswork, but they do eliminate the need for blocking
and they help prevent distortion of the needlework.
Bibliography
Levey, Santina M. Elizabethan Treasures: The Hardwick Hall
Textiles. Harry N. Abrams, Publishers, New York, NY, 1998.
Wilson, Erica. Erica Wilson's Embroidery Book, Charles
Scribner's Sons, NY, 1973.
Gostelow, Mary. The Complete Guide to Needlework Techniques
and Materials. Chartwell Books, Inc., 1982, ISBN 0890095973.
Schuette, Marie and Müller-Christensen, Sigrid. A
Pictorial History of Embroidery. Frederick A Praeger, Publisher,
NY, 1964.
Hughes, Therle. English Domestic Needlework. Abbey
Fine Arts, London |
