Palestinian embroidery - Research Paper Example

Embroidery in Palestine was used to portray the woman’s social class at that time. Currently, there are different styles and designs are applied in the embroidery trade. The different embroidery pattern can be traced back to different cultures. For example, the traditional designs were made by the village and Bedouin women. The designs were drawn from simple geometry and other shapes that governed their daily lives. The designs can be categorized into four main categories, namely ritual, technical, geographical, and structural.

The techniques used included appliqué, weaving and dyeing. Palestine embroidery was divided into regions and this reflected the different cultures. An example is in the wedding dresses where the motifs of the Bedouin and village dresses differed. The fabrics used in embroidery were specific. Before the Palestine’s began importing materials, they used the locally available fabrics. These include linen, cotton, silk, and linen. These materials at times would be mixed in different percentages to give a new material.

For example, the royal wedding dress used in Bethlehem weddings was made up of linen mixed with a high percentage of silk (malak). The most famous fabrics were white linen or cotton. In the villages and Bedouin, un-dyed linen and Indigo blue were the preferred colors for both sexes. For the mens clothes, soft wool and atlas silk was used to make their clothes. Before the production of synthetic dyes, the Palestine women used colors derived from insects and local plants. For example, the color red was derived from the insect cochineal.

Indigo was mainly obtained from plants (Indigofera tinctoria) 1.Even with the arrival of synthetic dyes, many women preferred using naturally obtained dyes as they did not fade away even with numerous washing as compared with synthetic dyes which fades off after washing. Motifs were of special importance in Palestine. This is because the way a woman