Ribbed metallic textile

Associated Artists

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

As early as 1884, Candace Wheeler's (1827-1923) firm Associated Artists designed a lightweight silk to be used for the nearly sheer curtains that were customarily hung under draperies of heavier fabrics. It was called “Beyreuth” silk to suggest an exotic Eastern quality and was described in the press as “changeable in lustre, showing at an eighth of an inch interval a gold weft thread.” This example of what we believe to be Beyreuth has a yellow warp and a blue weft, with a supplemental weft of gold metallic thread added in every seven rows. The mixing of the warp and weft colors makes the fabric appear green, but different effects occur when the cloth is draped. Wheeler’s firm also employed this type of fabric as the ground cloth for delicate embroideries.

The American Wing

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The American Wing's ever-evolving collection comprises some 20,000 works of art by African American, Euro American, Latin American, and Native American men and women. Ranging from the colonial to early-modern periods, the holdings include painting, sculpture, works on paper, and decorative arts—including furniture, textiles, ceramics, glass, silver, metalwork, jewelry, basketry, quill and bead embroidery—as well as historical interiors and architectural fragments.

Metropolitan Museum of Art