Interested in Gold work and/ or metal thread embroidery? This article in Science Daily about fiber technology will intrigue you at the least.
Textile researchers for the last decade have been researching methods if dispersing finely powdered titanium, aluminium, steel, copper and silver and then allowing these metals in atomic form to rain onto polyester fibers in order to coat the fiber. Why to produce a super fine metalic thread.
At the moment the technique is used for expensive high fashion garments ( I have some very real worries about the ethics of that) but I can see how the process described in Finest Silk Made of the Purest Nanometer-Thin Gold Woven into Ties and Handkerchiefs, is likely to be developed for other forms of decorative textiles too.
Strange world we live in.
That is so amazing. I wonder how many years it'll take before these fibers will be available for public consumption. I certainly can't afford a 7500 Swiss Franc tie.