R. Ackermann’s Repository of fashions was published 1829 and has been digitized and made available as free Google ebook.
For those with a tablet it is easily read or you can view it on your computer.
The book contains some really lovely fashion plates of the day which will be of great interest to anyone interested in the history of costume. They have a charm of their own that delighted me.
Also many crazy quilters print on fabric vintage images then incorporate these into their crazy quilt blocks they are the modern equivalent to cigarette silks.
For those readers who do not do crazy quilting on antique crazy quilts you will often find little pictures and images that were printed on silk. If you are interested here is an article about Cigarette Silks. These came in cigarette packets and women used to collect them and they got used in crazy quilts. Today with the aid of computers quilters print on fabric in the tradition of cigarette silks. The prints produced this way are even abbreviated to the words “silk cigie” or just cigie
Also the book contains many interesting embroidery patterns used in that period.
I have taken a few screenshots in the hope of enticing you to look at and enjoy reading the the book.
As I browsed these pages my imagination went to creating a series of Jane Austin themed crazy quilt blocks using this publication as a jumping off spot.
Friday freebies is a regular series in which I highlight free resources online, free patterns and links that are of interest to fiber folks. All posts in the series are in the Friday Freebie category I hope you enjoy them.
