Furnishing fabric

Object Type
This furnishing fabric has been printed using an engraved copper plate. The introduction of copper-plate printing in the 1750s meant new possibilities in the development of printed textile design, allowing a fineness of detail and delicacy of drawing which had not been achieved in earlier woodblock printed textiles. It also allowed much larger pattern repeats, which made it particularly suitable for bed hangings.

Materials & Making
China blue, which has been used here, was a complex process for printing with indigo known abroad as 'English blue'. It gave beautiful fast blues, but by a technique that could not be used with those needed for other colours, so 'pencilling' (hand-painting) of indigo was still needed for polychrome designs. The indigo was printed directly onto the cloth by plate or block as a finely-ground paste. The cloth was then immersed alternately in baths of lime (to dissolve the indigo) and iron-sulphate (to reduce it) as many times as was necessary to achieve the desired strength of blue.

Places
Bromley Hall, where this fabric was printed, was on the right bank of the River Lea in Poplar, East London. It was probably the largest of the early print works, first mentioned in the 1740s, and it continued in operation into the early 19th century.