The vast majority of the items in the Prints & Photographs Division’s collections are works of art on paper, such as photographs, posters, and architectural drawings. However, there are exceptions. In my latest Flickr album heralding the coming of autumn, there are two items featured that are not on paper at all, but are instead printed on fabric! Any guesses how these were meant to be used? I’ll include one of the examples from the Flickr set here:
If you said pillow covers, you are absolutely right! These nearly two foot squares of fabric were designed as covers for decorative pillows. Our collection includes about a hundred examples. The subjects vary quite a bit, ranging from courtship to college teams, from sentimental scenes to holidays. I’ve collected a few samples below. One striking image shows President Theodore Roosevelt in a particularly positive light!
- Explore all the pillow covers of this format and era in our collections.
- Browse thousands of images in the PAGA 7 collection, which includes these pillow covers. It also includes advertisements, calendars, printing specimens, and other visual ephemera.
- Check out the latest Flickr set, Autumn Arriving, with a variety of images related to the coming fall.
Comments (3)
Lovely collection. I’m wondering how these are stored in the Library of Congress? Are the pillow covers all on fabric? Are they then photographed for digital display such as in your post? Curious about the process – thanks!
Hello Cheryl,
Thanks for your questions! The pillow covers I’ve talked about in the blog post are all on fabric, typically what looks to be a woven cotton or linen. They are part of a much larger collection of paper prints and ephemera, referred to as PAGA 7, that I linked to above. A portion of that collection has been digitized at high resolution, including these pillow covers, using a specialized overhead scanner. They are stored in archival paper folders in mapcase drawers.
Thank you! Very helpful. I’m also wondering how the design was originally added to the fabric. Was it painted on? Do you know if each pillow cover was one of a kind or were they manufactured in bulk.