Why a "pin pillow" and not "pincushion"? Because I can't document the word 'pincushion' any early than the 1630s, but I can document "pin pillow." For example, the 1582 will of Elizabeth Gorson includes a bequest of “a purse and a pin pillow of crimson velvet embroidered with gold and purl.”[1]
Above, L: Pin pillow before stuffing Above, Ctr: Complete with tassels and brass pins in place Above, R: Close-up of embroidery
Comparison to Extant Period Pieces : Two varieties of pincushions appear in museum collections: small square ones about 2.5" square attached to matching sweet bags, and larger rectangular ones undoubtedly meant to sit on a dressing table. Extant pieces are embroidered in silk and metal in tent and other stitches on linen canvas (I do not have estimates of stitch counts) and lined with silk. Not many pincushions survive, and some that do show no sign of use. The assumption is that they were meant as display pieces, and there are examples where the background is embroidered in silver and silver gilt. The floral designs on extant pieces are similar to embroidery styles seen on clothing; the interlacing pattern I used is also of a type used on clothes. In size, mine is larger than pincushions attached to sweet bags, but smaller than the rectangular examples at the V&A. I intended mine to be 1/3 larger than it is (and rectangular), but didn't have enough silk floss. I chose to use silver gray silk for the background as I don't have silver to use. Also, this is not intended as a ‘show piece' but will be used regularly —hence the brass pins already stuck in.
Materials & Technique. Pillow front : 20 count linen canvas, embroidered in tent stitch with 2 ply spun silk dyed in period colors (dk green, green, lt blue, dk blue and silver gray, from Aurora Silk). Pillow back : Silk taffeta, mordanted with alum & dyed with fustic by Kateryn Rous. Interior : Sewn with silk thread, and stuffed with wool. Tassels : Made with silk floss dyed in period colors.
Unfortunately, I miscalculated the amount of silver gray needed for the background, and I had to pick apart another embroidery to finish the last 20% or so of the background.
Design Source: Johann Siebmacher (1597) as reproduced in the New Carolingian Model Book |
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Notes
1. F.G.Emmison, Elizabethan Life: Wills of Essex Gentry and Merchants, Proved in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury . Chelmsford , UK : Essex County Council, 1978: .
Bibliography
Beck, Thomasina (1995). The Embroiderer's Story: Needlework from the Renaissance to the Present Day . Newton Abbott, Devon , England .
Digby, George Winfield (1963). Elizabethan Embroidery . London : Faber & Faber.
Emmison, F.G. (1978). Elizabethan Life: Wills of Essex Gentry and Merchants, Proved in the Prerogative Court of Canterbury . Chelmsford , UK : Essex County Council.
Nevinson, J.L. (1938). Catalogue of English Domestic Embroidery of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries. London : Victoria & Albert Museum .
Salazar, Kim Brody (1995). The New Carolingian Modelbook: Counted Embroidery Patterns from Before 1600 . Albuquerque : Outlaw Press.
Victoria & Albert Museum , http://www.vam.ac.uk