The dress must have looked stunning. Possibly designed by Anna Marie Garthwaite*
This piece would look good framed.
woven with five different flower sprays emerging from behind fences or a Rococo shell motif, all in clear shades of cerise, pink, aubergine, yellow, black, green and blue, on a fine twill weave ivory ground, 21 x 13 1/4 in/ 54 x 34 cm.
Few minor marks near the bottom of the silk.
There are linen threads to the selvedges where the skirt was unpicked which is rather nice. The original full repeat was 42 inches or1.07 m in length
*Thanks to Clare Browne, Textiles Curator, V& A. for looking at this piece for me. She suggests: Anna Marie Garthwaite has several designs from around 1747/8 which have similar symetrical sprigs, often marshalled into self coloured cartouches.
See: Natalie Rothstein's Catalogue of Silk Designs plates 244 and 256 and page 233.
See: Natalie Rothstein Silk Designs of the Eighteenth Century, In the Collection of the V&A Museum p.238, designs by Anna Maria Garthwaite c.1749 – similar pattern filling space between stems
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