Lace Towel End (c. 1700s–1800s): Art, History and Details

Lace Towel End (c. 1700s–1800s) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

This lace was used to embellish a towel end. Textiles of this type are valuable for their lace work depicting ancient folk motifs, ritual significance, exemplification of the role of textiles in Russian society, and connection to a prominent woman collector, Natalia de Shabelsky, without whom this textile and others like it might have been lost.

Object facts

• Title: Lace Towel End
• Date: c. 1700s–1800s
• Culture: Russia, Nizhny-Novgorod province
• Type: Lace
• Technique: cotton or linen (est.); straight (continuous) bobbin lace (Vologda tape lace). The tape forms figural or plant motifs outlined with gimp (heavy cord) with a polychrome plaited ground linking the tape; applied silk (est.) ribbon
• Dimensions: Overall: 26 x 37 cm (10 1/4 x 14 9/16 in.)
• Collection: T - Lace
• Department: Textiles
• Accession number: 1931.107

A detail from the museum

Lace making was a common tradition in many cultures because it displayed the skill of the mother or daughter who made the lace.

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Pushkin, B. M, B. M Pushkin, N. de Shabelsky, and N. de Shabelsky. Exhibition of National Russian Art, 17th, 18th and Early 19th Centuries: Peasant Embroideries, Costumes, Headdresses, Hand-Woven Materials, Laces, Ikons, Articles of Silver, Copper, Etc.: Shown by Count and Countess B.m.-Pushkin. Place of publication not identified: publisher not identified, 1900.
• Valance, Aymer. "Russian Peasant Industries." The studio: an illustrated magazine of fine and applied art. London: Offices of the Studio, 1893-1964. volume 37, 1906.

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.