CUT OR OPEN WORK
Cut work can be most interesting both to look at and to carry out. In the XVIIth century Italy was famous for its punto tagliato or cut work. John Taylor mentions "rare Italian cutworke" in "The Praise of the Needle." This poem may perhaps be of interest to some; it was prefixed to a book of embroidery patterns of cut work named "The Needle's Excellency." It ran through twelve editions, the first of which was printed in 1621, and sold at "the signe of the Marigold in Paules Churchyard." Copies may be seen in the British Museum Library; in the Bodleian, Oxford, in the Ryland's Library, Manchester, and occasionally elsewhere. [Fig. 120] shows a pattern taken from this book.
There are several distinct varieties of cut work, for instance, that known as renaissance embroidery, which is usually composed of an arabesque design from which the background is cut away, leaving the pattern in the linen; the cut edges are outlined and protected by an overcast stitch. The pattern has to be specially planned with the idea of holding strongly together, but, if necessary, buttonholed bars can be added to form strengthening ties in any weak part.
Another kind of cut work is that known as broderie anglaise, and sometimes as Madeira work, over which our grandmothers spent much time, perhaps without adequate result. The pattern is followed out by round holes pierced in the linen with a stiletto and then overcast round the edges. At the present day the work is done mostly by machinery, though hand work also is procurable.
Perhaps the prettiest kind of cut work is that in which various-shaped spaces are cut out of the linen, and these filled in, in part, with some design built up with stitches. There are various methods of refilling the spaces cut out, one of the simplest is a diapering formed by some lace stitch, such as an open buttonhole. As a rule, the decoration of the open spaces is based upon bars of thread that are either composed of warp or woof threads left, instead of being cut away, or else upon fresh threads thrown across in various directions. The pattern is planned on and about these strengthening ties, and where necessary receiving support from them. An ingenious worker will soon devise ways of refilling the spaces by all kinds of interesting patterns, which can be geometrical or floral, or any kinds of objects that can be attractively represented in conventional fashion, such as figures, birds, insects, ships in full sail, or anything else. It must, however, be remembered that the various forms filling the spaces are for use in the way of strength as well as for ornament, and that the work is often put upon objects that have to endure daily wear.
Open work is frequently mixed with other, and especially with white embroidery, and such things as counterpanes may be seen arranged with a chequering of alternate squares of embroidered linen and open work.
[Fig. 121] shows in progress a simple method of filling a space, mainly making use of the strengthening threads that have been left at regular intervals over the cut part. The threads are covered with an overcast stitch, and alternate squares of those that recur over the space are decorated with a cross. This is made by the working thread, after reaching the right point at the centre of an overcast line, being thrown across the space and then twisted back over itself to the starting-point, where it is in the right position for continuing the overcast line. The crosses being put in at the same time as the overcasting of the bars renders some forethought necessary to get each in at just the right time and place.