Georgian Embroidery Patterns in the Lady’s Magazine (1770–1819)

Abstract

This article analyses the c. 650 needlework patterns issued in the Lady’s Magazine; or, Entertaining Companion for the Fair Sex between 1770 and 1819. The patterns were vital to the periodical’s appeal and materialised important aspects of its ethos. As individual objects, as a collection and as a part of the women’s magazine’s multi-media ecology, the embroidery designs have much to teach us. This substantial material archive provides a wealth of insights into domestic embroidery practice as well as into the fashions, seasonality, transmission, circulation and evolution of needlework designs and amateur embroiderers’ skills across the late Georgian period.