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A Boro stage curtain
One of the items on display in Dunedin’s Tūhura Otago Museum‘s current exhibition of boro is a stage curtain, repurposed as a mosquito net. The show celebrates the craft and art of boro, the Japanese textiles that are mended and sewn together to extend their life. The collector, Pip Steel, has curated Boro – Timeworn…
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A burial site from Norway
In the 1300s, four young girls were buried below the floor of the Uvdal Stave Church in Norway and they have been rediscovered in a museum collection. The Museum of Cultural History in Norway has held the remains of the four girls since 1978 when archaeologists were investigating the old church. Beneath the floor they…
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Stray Threads (again)
The blog has recently moved over to The Textile Trust and many subscribers have already moved over to Stray Threads. For those of you who have not re-subscribed there is still time… At the foot of each post and each page on The Textile Trust, Aotearoa website is a Subscribe button that will take you…
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From the collection: El-Jay dress coat
An iconic piece of New Zealand Aotearoa’s fashion history has just been added to the collection: a cotton velvet dress coat by Gus Fisher. Gurshon Fisher was the youngest child of Michael Fisher, a Jewish émigré from Riga, Latvia and Fanny Dabscheck, the daughter of a Jewish Russian émigré to Australia. Known as Gus, he…
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Subscribing to Stray Threads, the new blog
The new website is sending out articles weekly now and the format has changed. Now there will be one main article with links to the rest of the articles on the website. This saves an enormous email coming out to you and will also encourage people to visit the website where there are going to…
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Contributing to Stray Threads
The new website is ready to receive submissions from readers. To send an article for consideration, use the button at the foot of each page marked “Submit an article”. At the moment it is only text that can sent while the system is tested but images can be sent by email or by adding a…
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From the collection: Ali-Shir Nava’i wall hanging
The studio collection of textiles, costume, fashion and art includes some special pieces. This wall hanging, a depiction of the artist/ linguist/ statesman/ poet and fierce defender and exponent of the Chagatai Turkic language, Ali-Shir Nava’i, is one of those. The work is made of silk and cotton with embroidery decoration and edges of crochet.…
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Vogue Couturier Pattern 817 (1954)
This week a pattern has been donated to the collection: Number 817 from the Vogue Couturier series, dating to 1954. With that era’s instantly recognisable style and flair, this pattern came from Milne & Choyce in Auckland, the purveyors of fashion to the cognoscenti. It is stamped with the legend “This pattern cannot be exchanged.…
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The Shetland lace shawl and the mining disaster
This lace shawl from Shetland has a beautiful history. In 2010 a disaster in the Pike River Mine devastated West Coast communities. The event killed 29 men and was New Zealand’s worst mining disaster since 1914 when 43 men died at Ralph’s Mine. A film was made fifteen years after the event and screened at…
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Matariki
It is the season of Matariki, the Māori New Year. Matariki is the Māori name of the Pleiades star cluster. At this time of year, when the stars reappear above the horizon, New Zealand celebrates the start of a new year, looks forward to the future and remembers those who have gone before us. Matariki…