At the Royal School of Needlework

This morning I went with a “ craft/ needlework” friend to a talk and exhibition about ‘Coronation Robes’ at the Royal School of Needlework at Hampton Court. ( It had been sold out in October/November so was extended and we had booked tickets back in November) 
 
The talk was given by the director/curator of the RSN. Unfortunately it was not as I had expected…..I naively thought we would see some Coronation Robes and the embroidery that had been done there. However we got an hour of a sort of PowerPoint presentation first…not a very polished presentation and then we looked around some of the bits and pieces they had, photos of bits of attire from the last 5 coronations  from 1902. There were also some samples of the designs and threads used for Charles III coronation. I particularly liked the cloak worn by Camilla, shown in the photo which has a variety of plants on it plus some insects and even a snail!  ( I tried to take photos in the room but was told to delete them 
despite the fact we were not told no photos at the start!) so this is from an online archive. The room it was held in was a sort of store room and the displays in cabinets had very poor labels….well below the standard of any museum/ exhibition I have been to for years and years. Very odd.

I did learn some things from her talk eg if you look at the photo you may wonder why you can only see one hand for each lady, it’s because the other is underneath the velvet which is on a frame, to pull or push the needle through. 

In October I went to a great exhibition at the Guildhall with lots of items which had gold embroidery, that was excellent! 

This afternoon I have been doing more work on my 2023 photobook.  Just December left to do!