CONTENTS

INDULGE textiles to buy, collect or simply admire 11 BUY LESS, BUY BETTER Christmas with a Conscience 30 SHOP TALK Ultramod: The 0ldest haberdashery in Paris by Rebecca Devaney photographs by Noelle Hoeppe 96 SWATCH Favourite Fabric: No51 Lutestring by Sarah Jane Downing, illustrated by Molly Martin GLOBAL textiles from around the world 22 AGAINST ALL ODDS Kyrgyz nomads in Afghanistan by Barbara Mathews Cieleszky photographs by Matthieu Paley 42 JEWEL IN THE CROWN Uzbekistan on the silk road by Darshini Ravindranath 48 MADE IN CHINA The silk road to soft power by Amber Butchart 62 PEACE CORPS Eri Silk - Inside the cocoon by Anna-Louise Meynel, photographs courtesy of We are Kal ANECDOTE textiles that touch our lives 32 RABBITS PULLED OUT OF HATS The zoomorphic baby hats of China by Catherine Legrand photographs by Sophie Tramier 52 SILK SCREEN A dangerous liaison between silk and the silver screen by Lesley Millar 68 EN POINTE The ballerina tutu an icon of femininity by Sophia Sheppard 72 MAKING CONVERSATION Emily Jo Gibbs talks to Mary Schoeser 76 A STITCH UP Textile production in prison by Dr Nicola Donovan ATTIRE critical reporting of fashion trends 38 TAKING SILK Silk and Sumptuary Laws by Sophie Pitman 66 PLANE AND SIMPLE The Summer House find inspiration in the Rann of Kutch by Laura Gray INDUSTRY from craft to commerce 13 CHINESE WHISPERS Chinese export shawls by Shuye Zhang photographed by Steven Meisel 40 TRADE SECRETS The Master Silk Printer by Elizabeth Broman COHABIT stunning interiors beautifully photographed 16 JOURNEYS END Soledad Twombly’s textile collection photographed by Antonio Monfreda 56 THE KING OF SILK The golden-orange glow of Jim Thompson’s House by Elizabeth Caldwell

RABBITS PULLED OUT OF HATS

The zoomorphic baby hats of China

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For thousands of years, silk has been treated as a luxury item in the global textile trade. It has played a significant role in promoting exchange and learning between East and West in terms of production, technique, pattern, design and creative values. In the 19th century, the luxury of silk became more widely appreciated by the expanding bourgeoisie, and the fabric was bought and used as a symbol of wealth and taste. The use of silk to signal refinement led to the fashion for Chinese export shawls, in the 19th and early 20th centuries in Europe and America. Sericulture (silk production) and the textile manufacturing industry in China had been affected by political events such as the Taiping Rebellion (1850–1864). During this time, the silk-producing areas of the country (Shanghai, Jiangsu, Fujian and Guangdong) as well as the urban silk weaving industry, suffered significant damage when the rebellion’s forces struck the lower Yangtze valley region in the early 1860s. However, despite this, the last quarter of the nineteenth century witnessed a recovery and increase in the export of both raw silk and silk fabrics, according to customs statistics. Chinese shawls were also called Mantónes de Manila, or Spanish shawls. They were originally exported to Spain from China via Spanish trading ships known as the Manila Galleons. In the 19th century, Manila, in the Philippines, and Guangzhou (also known as Canton), in China, were the two major cities for the trade in Chinese shawls by Spanish merchants. Some writers think that the design of Chinese shawls was inspired by costumes from the Spanish Empire, and they were certainly deeply influenced by this culture. Later, the popularity of the shawls as export goods spread beyond Spain to other parts of Europe. The fashion for Chinese export shawls in

Europe coincided with the increasing demand from European women for high quality and elegant shawls. Interest in Chinese export shawls ran in parallel with the introduction of Indian cashmere shawls to Britain and France in the late 18th century and the popularity of locally-produced cashmere shawls made by Jacquard in the early 19th century, in imitation of Indian cashmere shawls.

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Left; Chinese Shawl, Black silk crepe

ground embroidered with twisted silks in satin stitch peonies, poppies and other f lowers, knotted black silk

fringe, 70.5 x 69 cm

Chinese export shawls were made of either plain, brocaded or embroidered silk. They could be worn or draped over furniture as part of ‘artistic’ interior decoration. Initially rectangular, square-shaped shawls became popular in the late 1840s. Most shawls had a crepe silk ground, in which the weft is more strongly twisted than the warp, resulting a crisp surface and tough fabric. In Liberty catalogues, white Chinese crepe fabrics were so strong, and thus

washable, that they were referred to as ‘washing fabrics’. Some shawls were embroidered on both sides with twisted silk, giving the pattern a 3-D effect. It is possible that the crepe silk ground and twisted embroidery were not only decorative, but were deliberately used to enhance the toughness and strength of the shawls, giving them a longer lifetime. This two-sided embroidery also had a connection with their use. Most square-shaped shawls were worn folded into a large triangle, so both sides needed to be patterned. These shawls could be embroidered half on one side, diagonally, and half on the other. When folded into a large triangle, the two embroidered halves were displayed. As the shawl business moved from the hands of individual traders to large companies, an elaborate and expensive system of advertising developed, and the same syndicated advertising content relating to Chinese silk shawls appeared on the pages of England’s regional newspapers. As well as adverts, department store catalogues, such as those for Liberty Art Fabrics, were used to encourage mail-order purchasing. Although Chinese shawls were not much worn after the 1920s, they still provide inspiration for designers. John Galliano, known for constantly pushing the creative boundaries, designed a red silk gown drawing upon Chinese silk shawls for his 1997 collection for Dior. Galliano created a dress in which fluid red silk transforms into a shawl, becoming the train of the dress. As the silk scholar John Mackenzie has observed, silk symbolised ‘everything that Europeans imagined about the Orient: richness, craftsmanship, refined taste, and exceptional beauty of design’. Unlike Indian cashmere shawls, Chinese shawls were never part of mainstream fashion in China. As a product for export, as well as a cross-cultural fantasy, they have nourished the Western appetite for the exoticism of China and ‘the East’ more widely. Remarkably, this appetite is still in evidence today. Shuye Zhang

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is a government-backed project to shift the economy towards advanced manufacturing sectors including robotics, ocean engineering, satellites and high-tech transportation, among others, speaking to the desire to reclaim the ‘Made in China’ tag and have it stand for quality and innovation rather than budget mass production. It has ruffled enough feathers to have been criticised by Donald Trump and cited in his threats of a trade war between the US and China. Historically, viewing fashion as a form of soft power can help to unpick the cross-cultural impact of Chinese aesthetics on European design and vice versa, as well as the shifting cultural influence of nations. China is the world’s second largest economy (by nominal GDP), and remains a leading producer and exporter of silk. Recognition can be found in blockbuster museum shows such as China: Through the Looking Glass, a collaboration between the Costume Institute and the Department of Asian Art at New York’s Metropolitan Museum in 2015. The exhibition

was the Met's fifth most-visited show ever, topping 2011’s Alexander McQueen: Savage Beauty which was the Costume Institute’s previous bestseller. China: Through the Looking Glass focused on China as a source of inspiration to the West and had to negotiate a fine line between celebrating and perpetuating reductive notions of Orientalism, a thread which was woven through the documentary by Andrew Rossi about the show’s curation, The First Monday in May (2016). A previous show at the V&A in 2011, Imperial Chinese Robes from the Forbidden City, saw many Qing Dynasty garments on display in Europe for the first time. Within China, an interest in rebuilding museum collections developed in the wake of Mao’s Cultural Revolution, which saw unprecedented destruction of historical sites in an attempt to eliminate the ‘Four Olds’ – Old Customs, Old Culture, Old Habits and Old ideas – in the name of progress. The 1990s saw an acceleration of attempts to rebuild and re-prioritise heritage (Hangzhou’s China National Silk Museum opened in 1992), and

museum collaborations now form part of the OBOR initiative. Concurrently, a new generation of designers and brands such as Awaylee, C.J. Yao, Ms Min and Alexander T. Zhao are repositioning attitudes towards Chinese design and luxury on both a domestic and international stage. Established couturier Guo Pei is known for celebrating the handwork element of her craft, regularly clocking up thousands of hours to create a single dress (including the one Rihanna wore to the Met Gala). Taking inspiration from Chinese material culture such as blue and white porcelain, she is redefining luxury using concepts from both China and Europe and in 2016 was invited to become a guest member of the Chambre Syndicale de la Haute Couture in Paris, the governing body of French couture. As with Hangzhou, fashion in China points towards a fusion of celebrating the past and a future-focused embrace of the present. A reappraisal of the ‘Made in China’ label might just be the beginning. Amber Butchart

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SILK-STOCKING DISTRICT

Silk and Sumptuary Laws

On January 24, 1565, a man named Richard Walweyn was arrested in the City of London. His crime? Wearing ‘a very monstrous & outrageous great pair of hose.’ Exact details of Walweyn’s trousers were not recorded by the court scribe, so we have to imagine what exactly caused so much offence. But we do know that as a servant, Walweyn was prohibited by law from wearing silk legwear, particularly the overstuffed style that was all the rage amongst London fashionistas in the mid-sixteenth century. The court went to great efforts to punish Walweyn, stripping him and hanging up his hose in ‘some open place’ where passers-by could see this ‘example of extreme folly.’ Walweyn was also detained and imprisoned until he could afford to purchase a new pair of breeches of a ‘decent & lawful fashion & sort according to the form of the Queen’s Highness proclamation.’ When Walweyn was told to buy new hose according to Queen Elizabeth I’s proclamation, the court was referring to the recent dictation taken straight from the monarch’s mouth in 1562. Her orders had been printed and nailed to posts in town squares across the country, reminding her subjects of their clothing limitations - including that no man under the status of a baron was allowed to wear silk,

velvet, or satin. These sumptuary laws (named

from the Latin word ‘sumptus,’ meaning

expense) were part of a cross-European

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of certain goods to members of the elite. In many countries these laws focused on clothing, listing certain fabrics, colours, trimmings, and styles that were forbidden to the lower classes. Only noblemen and noblewomen could wear sumptuous imported textiles coloured with rare dyestuffs like cochineal red velvets, while those lower down the social scale were expected to buy homespun woollen or linen clothing in hues dyed with local plants such as madder, woad, and weld. New fashions - like large stiff ruffs and stuffed baggy breeches - were also scrutinised and controlled, and in Elizabethan London no fabric elicited more attention than silk. Silk was not new to 16th century London, but thanks to improved trade networks, a developing silk industry in Europe, and rising urban prosperity, many more people were able to purchase some lustrous ribbons or satin cloth for themselves. In fact, silk had entered the law books as far back as 1337, with a decree forbidding servants and craftsmen along with their wives and children from wearing gold, silver, embroidery, enamel, and silk. For the next two hundred and sixty-five years, the use of silk was policed in England, with regular tweaks in the law updating and even complicating fashion allowances. King Henry VIII made sure to remind the people that purple silk, the finest of all, was restricted to the royal family, and tinselled satin and gold or silver silk cloth was reserved only for those above the status of an earl. Even silk gowns, coats, shirts, laces, and embroidery were kept for those with elevated social status, and

anyone who wanted to trim their horse with silk needed to have an income of at least £200. The best a working man could hope for was a silk ribbon for his bonnet. Surviving knitted wool caps in the Museum of London still show evidence of these ribbon decorations, suggesting that people made the most of this right to silk. Like many other legal controls on clothing, Elizabeth’s proclamations were ignored, and so London’s guildsmen had to intervene. Walweyn’s crime prompted a surge of activity in London. That same afternoon in January 1565, members of the court were ordered to return to their parishes to search and remove any illegal silk clothing and ‘monstrous’ large trousers from shops and stalls, and apprehend anyone wearing inappropriate garments. Over the next months, the courtroom filled with silken offenders such as a fencing master called Edmund Dancy who was caught with an illegal silk doublet and girdle belt, and a man named John Haywood who must have looked dashing in his silk-lined hose and shirt with a double ruff. A network of London’s most responsible craftsmen and merchants acted as fashion police, guarding every entrance to the city, with four men even stationed on London bridge. So what was so offensive about silk? Although a few immigrant craftspeople were beginning to set up small silk weaving industries in London, almost all silk was imported into Elizabethan England. English elites were keen to keep control of foreign luxuries, partly so that they retained an exclusive right to fashions that would mark

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themselves out from those of lower social status, and also because of a fear that imports were damaging the economy. Elizabeth’s secretary of state Sir William Cecil said that allowing an ‘excess of silks’ was ‘consent to the robbery of the realm.’ Others thought that silk was unnatural. During a debate in the House of Commons in 1621, one member of parliament reminded his fellow politicians that ‘God did not attire our first parents with excrements of worms.’ The moralist Philip Stubbes feared that silks led to sin, writing ‘it is impossible for a man to wear precious apparel and gorgeous attire and not to be proud thereof.’ Stubbes was particularly upset by the sensory delights of silk, critiquing men and women who ‘ruffle now in silks, velvets, satins, damasks, gold, silver and what not else.’ He might have been right about the forbidden sensual desires prompted by silk, as some London prostitutes were said to keep trunks of fine silk clothing for clients who wished to indulge its silky feel and rustling sounds. Silk’s appeal proved too strong to resist, and the English courts soon gave up on policing Londoners for their clothing. The new King, James I, repealed the laws in 1603 and even tried to promote an English silk industry, paving the way for the celebrated Spitalfields silk industry that emerged at the end of the century. But silk’s slippery sheen and association with luxury and eroticism still connects us back to the men and women of the Elizabethan era who were so captivated by the fabric that they were willing to break the law just to wear it. Sophie Pitman

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