One of two fragments of ciselé silk velvet intended for furnishing. On a golden yellow satin ground, the design is woven in two silk piles (crimson and green). One of the pieces (T.271-1965) shows the upper segment of the deity Kwan Yin, a far eastern variant of a Bodhisattva (better known in south Asia as Avalokiteshvara). The other fragment (T.271A-1965) is of the central part of the arch surmounting Kwan Yin.
These fragments, said by the donor to have come from Ditchley Park, may belong to the velvet which is covering the walls of the Velvet Room, originally designed as the State Bedroom. The velvet is said to have been acquired for the second Earl by his brother, Admiral Fitzroy Lee, in Genoa in 1738 at a time when he was stationed in the Mediterranean. The room was still used as the State Bedroom when Mrs. Lybbe Powys visited the house in 1778; ''A bedchamber with hangings, bed, and furniture of crimson and yellow velvet is shown as a great curiosity, but I think ugly. The pattern is all pagoda.'' She added that after the velvet was finished the loom was broken ''that no one else may have the same'', but as she was under the illusion that the velvet was made in China one need not credit the legend.