Bengali export embroideries of the 16th and 17th centuries included a range of styles. The mini-colcha project I completed a few months ago was modeled on this amazing colcha at the MFA Boston, but that’s not the only style or even the most common one.
I am now working on a series of small sample pieces to illustrate the range of embroidery styles in the surviving historic colchas and capes. Almost all of the pieces include small birds somewhere in their imagery, so each of my samples will be a little bird.
Here is the first sample, based on another of the colchas I viewed at the MFA Boston (I called it MFA #2 on this blog). It’s worked in chain stitch with handspun 2-ply yellow tussar silk thread. I made the thread on my charka using yellow-dyed silk sliver from Treenway Silks. The fabric is unbleached linen.
Ysabel's Notebook 