Damasks, Armorers, Brocades, Brocateles.
It is difficult to define these weaves in a few words, and quite impossible to describe the extraordinary variety of textile effects produced by modern manufacturers, both in the basic weaves and in combination of two or more techniques.
Photo by Grignon.
Figure 34.—Authenticity is stressed in this handsome sofa upholstered in a fabric which is an exact reproduction of a print used more than a century ago. The monotone print is in a soft brown tone. Accompanying the sofa is a duck-foot cocktail table with removable glass tray, and lovely gold framed portrait of Jenny Lind. The Axminster rug is a "texture chintz" in a tile green with small red, beige, and brown flowers.
Damasks are pileless figured fabrics in which the pattern is produced by exposing the warp threads, and the ground by exposing the weft threads; or the reverse. They may be made with both warp and weft in the satin weave, in which case the only contrast between pattern and ground is that caused by the direction of the lines; or with warp satin figures on a weft ground of taffeta or twill weave; or with weft satin figures on a ground of contrasting weave. Warp and weft may be of exactly the same color; or of two tones of one hue; or of two different hues. More than two colors are possible only through the device of striping, where warp threads of additional hues are introduced to form stripes which necessarily run the whole length of the piece. Damasks are made of silk, rayon, wool, cotton, mohair, linen, or jute, or in mixtures of two or more of these fibers.
Armures look like twilled weave damasks, except that they have small raised patterns produced by floating warp threads.
Brocades are embroidery effects produced by floating wefts on the surface of damask, satin, taffeta, and other weaves. Gold or silver metal threads are sometimes introduced in the figures.
Brocateles were originally somewhat coarse fabrics of silk and wool or silk and cotton with designs produced by the brocade weave. The term is now also applied to a type of heavy satin damask in which the satin figure is on a lustrous ground of the same or contrasting color.