“Leads readers from the Stone Age to the twenty-first century, while weaving its story from strands of craft, history and anthropology, and science and culture. . . . An outstanding achievement.” ―Library Journal There are few aspects of our lives―physical, emotional, spiritual―in which thread and fabrics do not play a notable part. Beverly Gordon reminds us memorably and movingly of the powerful significance of fabric throughout human history. Her expertise is enriched by her own hands-on experience: spinning silk from silkworm cocoons, weaving cloth, and creating natural dyes. In addition, she has studied thousands of textiles in a curatorial context; her familiarity includes the processing and handling of textiles as well as the making of them. The author bridges past and present, from the Stone Age―when humans first learned to make cordage and thread―to twenty-first-century “smart fabrics,” which can regulate body temperature or measure the wearer’s pulse. Her discussion integrates craft, art, science, history, and anthropology, and she draws on examples from around the globe. A dazzling array of illustrations includes paintings and photographs of historic and contemporary textiles plus a broad collection of textiles being created, worn, and lived with today. 380 illustrations, 318 in color

Textiles: The Whole Story

Arts & Photography

Gordon, Beverly

Decorative Arts & Design

Thames&Hudson

A worldwide history for anyone with a passion for textiles and textile arts, whether creative, professional, or educational. There are few aspects of our lives―physical, emotional, spiritual―in which thread and fabrics do not play a notable part. Beverly Gordon reminds us memorably and movingly of the powerful significance of fabric throughout human history. Her study of textile art and history is combined with her own hands-on experience: spinning silk from silk- worm cocoons, weaving cloth, and creating natural dyes. The author bridges past and present from the Stone Age, when humans first learned to make cordage or thread, to twenty-first-century “smart fabrics,” which can regulate body temperature or measure the wearer’s pulse. Her discussion integrates art, science, history, and anthropology, and she draws on examples from around the globe. A dazzling array of illustrations includes paintings and photographs of both historic and contemporary textiles and a broad collection of textiles being created, worn, and lived with. 250 full-color and 100 black-and-white illustrations

Textiles: The Whole Story: Uses, Meanings, Significance

Surveys the history of feltmaking, and describes felt's characteristics, manufacture, and use in art, clothing, and industry

Feltmaking: Traditions, Techniques, and Contemporary Explorations

Science & Math

Technology

Watson-Guptill Publications

A comprehensive book on the kinds of textiles the Shakers used, how they were produced, and their cultural and economic importance to the communities.

Shaker Textile Arts

Religion & Spirituality

Univ Pr of New England

Today we witness a steadily growing interest in the Shakers and their way of life, especially their crafts. Although Shaker furniture, architecture, and herbs, for example, have been written about repeatedly, there are no other studies in depth of another all-important element in Shaker lives--Shaker textiles. Beverly Gordon, an experienced craftswoman and teacher, presents a comprehensive, illustrated book on the kinds of textiles the Shakers used, how they were produced, and their cultural and economic importance to the communities. She shows how Shaker beliefs were manifested in the actual artifacts and integrates detailed technical information in a way that will appeal to the nonprofessional admirers of these crafts as well as to experts. Professional dealers may use the book to verify the authenticity of a variety of items. An introductory chapter is followed by sections on the general characteristics of the textiles, their importance in Shaker lives, and the types of textile activities they undertook. Textile production, including fiber preparation, spinning, weaving, dyeing, knitting, crocheting, and sewing, is examined. Detailed descriptions of rugs and floor coverings, chair and seat tapes and cushions, clothing and personal accessories, popular cloth, and fancywork are followed by appendices on original Shaker weaving drafts, analyses of rugs and chair seat tapes, dye recipes, and instructions for knitting and constructing “fancy” items. This indispensable reference work results in part from the author’s close association with Shaker textiles between 1973 and 1977, when she was a textile interpreter at Hancock Shaker Village. Since then she has had access to artifacts and original manuscripts and documents throughout the country, works that are reflected in her full bibliography. A study from the procurement and processing of materials to the uses of finished products, this is a book of lasting value to collectors and antique dealers, museum curators, home economists, historians, weavers, and fiber artists with related specialties.

University Press of New England

The final steps: Traditional methods and contemporary applications for finishing cloth by hand

Interweave Press

Although women's charitable bazaars have contributed millions of dollars to important causes and institutions, they have long been thought of—by both historians and the public—as trivial events. Beverly Gordon corrects this view in Bazaars and Fair Ladies, the first history of women's fundraising fairs in the United States. Tracing their development from the early 1800s to the present day, Gordon show how women's fairs have reflected and influenced American culture, including styles of display and presentation, forms of public entertainment, attitudes about consumption and commodities, and perceptions of other cultures and of the past. Gordon surveys the fundraising fair phenomenon through its various names and incarnations, including ladies' sales, ladies' fairs, fancy fairs, fetes, festivals, carnivals, boutiques, and church or charity bazaars, and the many causes these events have benefitted, such as abolition, suffrage, and war relief. Drawing on a wide variety of historical documents—newspaper and magazine accounts, souvenir programs, photos, scrapbooks—as well as on fictional representations, interviews with fairgivers, and participant observation, Gordon provides detailed descriptions of fairs characteristic of specific periods, recreating what it felt like to walk into a Civil War sanitary fair or into Boston's "Atlantic City Boardwalk" fair of 1922. Throughout, she analyzes the ways in which the fundraising fair functioned as a vehicle for aesthetic and social meaning, creating rich environments that celebrated communal bonds. Gordon stresses the role women's bazaars played within the larger fair culture, demonstrating that many of the trends evident in American agricultural and trade fairs and international exhibitions had their origins in women's fundraisers. Highlighting changes in fair themes, aesthetic environments, consumer fashions, and critical responses from the public, Gordon also looks at similarities and differences among participants from varied ethnic and geographic communities. Gracefully written and abundantly illustrated, Gordon's study of this vital American cultural institution sheds light on 175 years of women's creativity, fellowship, and community-building. The Author: Beverly Gordon is a professor in the Environment, Textiles, and Design Department and serves the folklore and women's studies programs at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. She is the author of several books, including Shaker Textile Arts and American Indian Art: The Collecting Experience.

Bazaars & Fair Ladies: History American Fundraising Fair

History

Americas

Univ Tennessee Press

The Saturated World: Aesthetic Meaning, Intimate Objects, Women’s Lives, 1890–1940 explores the way middle-class American women in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries added meaning to their lives through their “domestic amusements”—leisure pursuits that took place in and were largely focused on the home. This pathbreaking study by Beverly Gordon demonstrates that these women elaborated on their everyday tasks and responsibilities by transforming them into playful, emotionally satisfying amusements. In doing so, they cultivated a heightened, aesthetically charged “saturated” state and created self-contained, enchanted worlds. Gordon explores a variety of female leisure activities of the era, including scrapbooking (collage making) party giving, dress-up, dollmaking, and collecting. Each chapter serves as a case study, and taken as a whole, the chapters provide a holistic overview of late nineteenth and early twentieth century women’s saturated worlds. In challenging the dismissal of domestic amusements, Gordon seeks to redress the assumption that women’s domestic activities were of less value than work done outside the home. In The Saturated World, Gordon seeks to restore women’s agency—to defy the assumption that women were passive pawns who acted only out of a lack of choice or power. Women chose these pursuits on their own, Gordon argues. She contends that they were operating out of a different paradigm of culturally invested meaning, based on domestic rather than workplace values. This did not in any way diminish their achievements. Richly illustrated, The Saturated World is an unusual combination of women’s history and material culture analysis that offers fascinating insight into women’s leisure activities. It is an ideal book for students of American studies, women’s studies, material culture, and popular culture.

The Saturated World: Aesthetic Meaning, Intimate Objects, Women's Lives, 1890-1940

This opulently designed volume looks at the dialogue between art and craft over the past century-plus. It compares works by Gustav Klimt, Edgar Degas, Jackson Pollock, Eva Hesse, Chiharu Shiota, Sergei Jensen and others to historical textiles from centuries past. Interdisciplinary essays provide extensive discussions of the materials and ideas utilized in textiles. Among the other artists featured are Magdalena Abakanowicz, Anni Albers, Joseph Beuys, Louise Bourgeois, Sonia Delaunay, Lucio Fontana, Mona Hatoum, Josef Hoffmann, Mike Kelley, Kimsooja, Paul Klee, Peter Kogler, Piero Manzoni, Agnes Martin, William Morris, Robert Morris, Blinky Palermo, Sigmar Polke, Gerhard Richter, Yinka Shonibare, Sophie Taeuber-Arp, Dorothea Tanning, Lenore Tawney, Rosemarie Trockel, Édouard Vuillard and Pae White.

Art & Textiles: Fabric as Material and Concept in Modern Art from Klimt to the Present

Böhme, Hartmut

Brüderlin, Markus

Petit, Emmanuel

Collections, Catalogs & Exhibitions

Hatje Cantz

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Gordon, Beverly. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Books by Gordon, Beverly

See the best price to sell, buy, or rent books by Gordon, Beverly. BookScouter helps to compare book prices from 25+ online bookstores and 30+ buyback vendors with a single search.

Textiles: The Whole Story

Textiles: The Whole Story: Uses, Meanings, Significance

Feltmaking: Traditions, Techniques, and Contemporary Explorations

Shaker Textile Arts

Shaker Textile Arts

The final steps: Traditional methods and contemporary applications for finishing cloth by hand

Bazaars & Fair Ladies: History American Fundraising Fair

The Saturated World: Aesthetic Meaning, Intimate Objects, Women's Lives, 1890-1940

Art & Textiles: Fabric as Material and Concept in Modern Art from Klimt to the Present