Embroidered Slipper Tops
1834-1889
Scroll
Embroidered Slipper Tops
1834-1889
Physical Qualities
Silk ground, silk embroidery threads, 12 1/4 x 18 1/4 in. (31.1 x 46.4 cm.)
Credit Line
Gift of Gloria B. and Herbert M. Katzenberg, Baltimore
Object Number
2012.603
Two embroidered but uncut silk slipper forms worked in multiple hues of silk thread on a woven silk gauze (?) mat. The designs are based on various Chinese motifs of beetles, flowers in vase, cloud shapes, lotus, wan, etc. contained within lozenges shapes outlined in black. The multiple colors of silk include: tight and dark blue, lt. and dark coral or pink, light and dark green, black, white. Stitches appear to be almost exclusively satin stitch stitches, but reverse is inaccessible. The work is mounted and framed in a narrow black frame.
The Baltimore Museum of Art by gift, 2012; Gloria Katzenberg, Baltimore, by purchase in the 1970s; Cora Ginsburg, NY
Neryalla Taunton, Antique Needlework Tools and Embroideries, 1997, pp. 172-173, color place 186, PL 11, pattern for Berlin Work slippers.
Barbara Morris, Victorian Embroidery: An Authoritative Guide, Mineola, N,Y.: Dover Publications, Inc.2003, unabridge republication of work originally published in "The Victorian Collector Series" by Thomas Nelson & Sons, NY in 1962 under title "Victorian Embroidery, p. 58, illus 10 Slipper Top. Berlin Wools and Silk on Canvas. Embroidered for the first Duke of Wellington about 1850 but not made up."
The Ladies Magazine, 1872.
Barbara Morris, Victorian Embroidery: An Authoritative Guide, Mineola, N,Y.: Dover Publications, Inc.2003, unabridge republication of work originally published in "The Victorian Collector Series" by Thomas Nelson & Sons, NY in 1962 under title "Victorian Embroidery, p. 58, illus 10 Slipper Top. Berlin Wools and Silk on Canvas. Embroidered for the first Duke of Wellington about 1850 but not made up."
The Ladies Magazine, 1872.
