Pocketbook with basket of flowers Pennsylvania, possibly Chester County, 1720-1750

Worked with silk over linen with spangles

Edgar William and Bernice Chrysler Garbisch, Cambridge, Maryland
Sotheby Parke-Bernet, "The Garbisch Collection, Volume IV," May 23-25, 1980, lot 861

"Women Only: Folk Art by Female Hands," New York, American Folk Art Museum, April 6-September 12, 2010
"Ooh, Shiny!," New York, American Folk Art Museum, September 13, 2012-January 13, 2013

American Radiance: The Ralph Esmerian Gift to the American Folk Art Museum, p. 303, fig. 265

Some loss of spangles; losses to silk.
In response to your inquiry, we are pleased to provide you with a general report of the condition of the property described above. Since we are not professional conservators or restorers, we urge you to consult with a restorer or conservator of your choice who will be better able to provide a detailed, professional report. Prospective buyers should inspect each lot to satisfy themselves as to condition and must understand that any statement made by Sotheby's is merely a subjective qualified opinion.
NOTWITHSTANDING THIS REPORT OR ANY DISCUSSIONS CONCERNING CONDITION OF A LOT, ALL LOTS ARE OFFERED AND SOLD "AS IS" IN ACCORDANCE WITH THE CONDITIONS OF SALE PRINTED IN THE CATALOGUE.

In 1597 John Gerard (1545-1612) published The Herball or Generall Historie of Plantes, whose illustrations became a primary source for needlework patterns. The basket of flowers stitched on this tiny pocketbook appears to take its cue from one such illustration; the diamond patterning on Gerard's basket and the cross-hatching of a pinecone-like flower are loosely interpreted in needlework stitches.¹ English embroidery traditions greatly influenced American needlework, especially in urban areas, where professional needleworkers advertised their services. Levy Simons, probably once a member of the English Embroiderer's Guild in London, advertised himself in the New York Mercury of October 9, 1758, as an "Embroiderer from LONDON," and stated that he "worked in Gold or Silver, shading in Silk or Worsted."²

The flowers worked in crewel on this small pocketbook are shaded in silk. The technique, as described in Simons's advertisement, was used to spectacular effect in large-scale projects such as bed furnishings but is less common in this small format. Metallic threads and spangles continued to be used in pictorial needlework of the late eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, when popular taste dictated neoclassical forms and shimmery silk-on-silk embroideries, with the effect heightened by the use of reflective materials like spangles and mica flakes.³ -S.C.H.

¹ Virginia Churchill Bath, Needlework in America: History, Designs, and Techniques (New York: Viking Press, 1979), frontispiece, p. 81
² Susan B. Swan, Plain & Fancy: American Women and Their Needlework, 1700-1850 (New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1977), pp. 109-10
³ My gratitude to Linda Baumgarten, Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, for her comments regarding the date of this pocketbook.