Cravat end

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Figural lace panels such as this one were items of gentlemen's high-fashion neckwear, meant to be attached to the end of a long, fine fabric cravat. The elaborate imagery, time-consuming to achieve, made the panels extremely expensive accessories. Drawing inspiration from contemporary formal gardens, the design of this example centers on a fountain with water jets that issue from the tip of Amor's raised arrow and fall to fill a basin for swimming birds. Set among the parterres planted with tulips and other flowers is a fountain in the form of the mythical wyvern, spouting water from its mouth, and garden statuary representing a nesting bird. A whimsically incongruous dagged cloth is festooned—tied to trees and secured by overlarge tassels. The ambiguous term point d'Angleterre does not refer in this instance to needle lace or the country of origin, but to a group of highest quality bobbin laces made in Brussels. The reference to England may denote the principal market for this type.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art