Over the last year I’ve been gradually showing you images that I took when I was last in Hawaii  of some of the beautiful historical garments at the Honolulu Museum of Art. You’ve seen the amazing embroidered cisele velvet 18th century man’s suit, a late 19th century Turkish tea robe that had been altered for wear by a Western woman, and a teaser-taster of all the textiles. Today I’m showing you what was possibly my favourite of all the things I photographed: Can you guess why?  Yep -it’s totally swoon-worthy, angels sing, yellow gold silk! And the fabric itself is just amazing: I’m not even sure how to describe the fabric – it’s a quite soft, lightweight silk, in a sort of brocade weave, but with the floating wefts reversed to the front of the fabric.  Very unusual, and not something I think I’ve ever seen before.  The small overall pattern, however, is quite common in early 19th century gowns. Those of you who have looked closely at the photo above will have noticed something …

The Historical Sew Fortnightly ‘Eastern Influence’ challenge, and my Chinoiserie promenade gown seem like the perfect opportunity to show you my 19th century Chinese ‘cloud collar’ – or what remains of it. My cloud collar really isn’t a full example – it’s missing one full lobe that would sit on the proper left shoulder, and half of the back lobe, and is quite damaged in other places I found the cloud collar in a bin of textile rags at the East Bay Depot for Creative Re-use in 2002 or 2003.  At the time, I didn’t know what it was, but I knew that it was Chinese, and I knew that it was old, and I knew that it was interesting, and I knew that at $5, even on a student budget, it was well worth buying! It’s been carried around in my stash ever since – brought out for talks, and as a study piece for my students. I’ve learned quite a bit about cloud collars in general since, and about the materials and make …