Finding inspiration in passementerie of the past

Above: A photo of the Second Life exhibition held at Zoffany’s London showroom.

In the past passementerie was often made using waste silk that was leftover from other areas of textile production. These precious silk scraps would have been gathered together and passed into the hands of the Passementier who would transform these leftovers into beautiful designs such as knotted fly fringes and tassels. I’m sure that many new passementerie making techniques and designs were created in response to the want and need to use every scrap of yarn and thread.

This practice not only demonstrated a resourceful use of materials but also elevated what might have been considered waste into objects of beauty and significance. Passementiers, with their intricate craftsmanship, were masters of turning these remnants into embellishments that adorned garments, furnishings and accessories. When I was asked by Zoffany, Benedict Foley and the Queen Elizabeth Scholarship Trust to create a statement piece of passementerie for the Second Life exhibition I was particularly inspired by the tradition of transforming ‘waste’ materials into an extraordinary new work.

Robe à la française (1775 - 1800) in the collection of the Met Museum.

This photo above shows a close-up of a section of a women’s dress which is covered in many meters of handmade knotted fly fringes, puffs and intricate ribbon work. Fly fringes were often made using tiny pieces of leftover silk thread that would have been formed into a little group of threads. This group of threads were then intricately tied and bound together to create a little fringe, before being attached to a longer thread using a crochet chain. This was a very common technique for making passementerie for both garments and furnishings in the 18th century.

Above: My Ring for Champagne tassel that I made for the Second Life exhibition.

In all of my work with passementerie, I frequently look at textiles (not just passementerie) as a source of inspiration for creating new designs. I love the creativity and ingenuity of makers that take ‘waste’ textiles and transform them into spectacular new designs, whether the motivation for doing so is through choice or practicality. For a long time I have been particularly drawn to the challenge of transforming the overlooked or discarded, using intricate techniques to transform what might otherwise be deemed unusable into something of beauty and value. I keep all of my yarn scraps, left over lengths of warp, individual lengths of thread - everything! These precious scraps are added to my many ‘confetti’ jars and I frequently work with these scraps to create new passementerie designs.

Second Life exhibition install shot showing the diversity of approaches used by makers to transform waste lengths of Zoffany’s Long Gallery Brocade fabric into new objects, fashion, art and furnishings.

When Zoffany commissioned me to create a piece for their Second Life exhibition, it presented the perfect opportunity for me to explore a new way of working with passementerie.  The brief from Zoffany & Benedict Foley asked me to reimagine and transform heavy weight upholstery fabric that had originally been used in Zoffany’s showroom at WOW! House into a new piece of work that showcased how ‘waste’ fabric can be transformed through hand making.

A typical interior of a horse drawn carriage from the 1800s showing a wonderful array of passementerie and tassels. The tassels would have been used as pulls to assist in opening the windows and doors of the carriage. Photo from Word Wenches

The design of Zoffany’s Long Gallery brocade fabric is very much rooted in an 18th century aesthetic and because of this I looked to traditional tassel designs from the 1700 and 1800s for inspiration. I came across the most fabulous examples of carriage tassels and bell pull tassels, both of which were largely made using long strips of fabric in combination with hand passementerie techniques.

My use of colour, texture and passementerie techniques within my tassel was directly inspired by Benedict’s show room design and I very much drew on the dramatic nature of the room through my use of pom poms, cartisan and handmade Ric-Rac.

Benedict Foley’s stunning room for Zoffany at WOW!House at Chelsea Harbour Design Centre.

My Ring for Champagne tassel is about to be auctioned in Chiswick Auctions Design Modern & Contemporary sale which is taking place on December 12th.