Pistoia: The Art of Embroidery

It is the hometown of lace, all of which is strictly done white on white. Not everybody knows that the art of embroidery in Pistoia follows a centuries-old tradition, whose roots lie in the distant past. It’s a story that begins in the abbeys and convents, where the nuns spent their time elegantly and soberly enriching white fabrics, embroidering tone-on-tone motifs of rare grace. The tradition soon spread outside the convent walls and a flourishing embroidery industry developed in Pistoia and its immediate vicinity in the 19th and 20th centuries, which gave work to many women.

An important occupation, which allowed the members of the fairer sex to contribute to the household income without sacrificing the time given to their children and home, as was considered good practice to do. The most fervent period of the growing embroidery business in Pistoia was in the 1920s and 30s, when actual schools were created often founded by wealthy local noblewomen, who taught the younger generation how to use the needle and thread.
The increase in production and sales also corresponded with the introduction of new styles and stitches, that is new production methods, which then became typical of the Pistoiese technique, such as the “punto toscano” and “punto di Casalguidi”, which takes its name from the place of the same name in the vicinity of the Tuscan town.


(Portions of this article first appeared in "Toscana & Chianti News")
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