Pochette, mid-18th century, view of flap lining

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Creator

Unknown

Date Created

Mid 1700s

Subject

Costume accessories; Costume accessories carried; Bags

Description

Mid-18th century. Embroidered pochette or envelope bag with a pointed flap and a green tape to wrap around it to close.

The exterior is worked in wool yarn crewelwork flowers with Bargello or needlepoint geometrical elements on the right side, on a loosely woven linen ground. The flowers are stitched in multiple shades of yellow, red, blue, green, and pink on a cream background. The edges of the bag are enclosed in a dark green plain weave tape.

The interior has a dividing panel sewn in at the sides but not the bottom to create two pockets. The flap is lined with a cream silk brocade fabric in a design of alternating diamonds, fruit, flowers, and birds woven in shades of pink and green. The walls and divider are lined in a plain weave striped silk, cream with alternating narrow stripes of pink outlined with red and yellow outlined with black. Handmade.

Extent

Width: 17.8 cm / 7 in.
Length (closed): 11.4 cm / 4.5 in.
Length (open): 21.3 cm / 8.375 in.

Provenance

Gift of the Coe family. Originally owned by John Knight of the Pickering-Knight family, Dover Point, New Hampshire, in the mid-18th century.

Museum Number

404

Publisher

University of New Hampshire Library

Medium

Wool, silk, linen

Contributor

Astrida Schaeffer, photographer/curator

Date Digitized

2-25-2019

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License

Comments

The Irma G. Bowen Historic Clothing Collection digital catalog was produced by the UNH Library Digital Collection Initiative, supported in part by a grant from the Mooseplate program and New Hampshire State Council on the Arts. Additional funding provided by the E. Ruth Buxton Stephenson Memorial Fund.
Photography copyright, Astrida Schaeffer.