Three-colour interlaced knotwork
Object number: ROMGH.2010.36.1
Type: Table cloth
Technique: Embroidered
Material: Textile
Width: 78cm | Height: 80.6cm
Production date: 1920 - 1968
The choice of colours focuses the eye on the embroidery of interlacing and knotwork in orange, blue and mauve. It clearly shows the complexity of the design. Presumably drawn by Bain, it may have been embroidered by one of his students or a member of his family.
The interlaced central flower with its mauve centre and the knotwork surrounds are all worked in stem stitch. The very simple, orange linear border is stitched in herringbone.
Across the globe interlaced knotwork designs were inspired by plaiting & basket weaving. However George Bain believed knotwork interlacing to be peculiar to Pictish and early Irish forms of Celtic art.
See: Bain’s Celtic Art, Methods of Construction page 25
Author: Barbara Pritchard
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