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Amgueddfa Cymru – Museum Wales
This sampler was made in Cardiff, about 1860, using a commercially produced pattern.
Sampler embroidered with 15 detached motifs, mostly geometric designs, in coloured wools on a canvas ground. Mostly embroidered in cross and basket stitch. 2 motifs use pale orange and maroon chenille thread to couch down long stitches made with wool. Made in Cardiff in about 1860.
5mm turnback on all four sides. Groundfabric is striped: every 10th pick (warp?) is pale yellow.
The colourful motifs found on this sampler were based on printed charts which were commercially produced in Berlin from the early 1800s. By the 1840s, ‘Berlin woolwork’ patterns were produced in vast quantities. Their popularity was largely due to their simplicity - each coloured square represented a stitch in a specific colour. Many ‘Berlin woolwork’ motifs and designs found their way into samplers.
