I am building up a collection of antique needlework, some I have got via Ebay, others on my travels (like the Chinese embroidery),  partly due to my interest in all forms of historical needlework but also as I feel a need to rescue things sometimes that may have been loved but for many reasons end up discarded.

I have been doing a lot of sorting out and decluttering recently and realised that although I bought this piece a couple of years ago I have never blogged about it.

What made me particularly think about what might have happened in both the creation and the subsequent life of this piece of stitching is that I have been doing lots of reading since teaching ended and I have more time.

I have been reading lots of books by Maureen Lee ,who I mentioned in an earlier post, which are set in wartime Liverpool and I wonder if this was to commemorate something.

I have not tried to take it apart to see if there are any details on the back as it is sealed in the frame. It is needlepoint and all of the canvas is covered in tent stitch in a fine wool. It is a small tray about 14 inches by 8 inches.

 

I would like to think it was a wedding gift for someone but hope it wasn’t to commemorate something less happy. I would like to imagine it being given to the happy couple who hopefully came through the war and were able to be together like my Nana and Grandad and raise a family.

My lovely Nana died this week after a short illness so I am feeling very sad. Thankfully she was able to come to the UK and see everyone for her 100th birthday which was brilliant.

Whenever I see stitching at museums and in historic houses and pieces like this I so want to know what happened, who made the piece and why, what happened to them after that. There is so much of our little history, our ordinary women’s history lost because it was never recorded which makes me so sad.

My contribution, however small, is to collect and love and cherish and share these things to honour their makers whoever they may be and whatever happened to them.

Thanks for visiting and see you soon.