Necessary, Useful, or Desirable: Histories of Furnishing Fabrics 

What does it mean to “furnish”? Today, the word tends to conjure up a more utilitarian meaning than decorate or ornament, while still implying a level of comfort or aesthetics above bare subsistence. This middle ground is rooted in the etymology of the word, which beginning in the sixteenth century meant to provide what is “necessary, useful, or desirable.” The multivalent meaning of furnish—or furnishing—applies well to textiles, which depending on their specific uses, also may be classed as necessities, comforts, or luxuries. In particular, as a category of textiles, furnishing fabrics embody the range of “necessary, useful, or desirable” in both their material and aesthetic attributes. On the one hand, the material properties of furnishing fabrics can demarcate space, provide warmth, reflect or shade from light, and generally protect the human body; on the other hand, their design characteristics convey personal status, cultural mores, trade relationships, and contemporary ideals of taste and beauty. Although furnishing fabrics are destined to be used in conjunction with other forms of the decorative arts—for example, as the outermost covering of upholstered furniture that mediates between the frame and the human body or the draping on walls and windows that harmonizes with ornamental plaster or woodwork—they are also artifacts in their own right.

Histories of furnishing fabrics—their production, categorization, and use—are often folded into other topics (history of upholstery, history of interior decorating, history of printed textiles, etc) but are not often studied in their own right. As a result of the ongoing exploration of a significant corpus of furnishing fabrics in the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection, part of the Center for Design and Material Culture at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, we seek to bring together scholarship that defines and analyzes this category of textiles.

The outcome of this project will include at least one publication, and some form of active conversation (whether an in-person symposium, an online workshop, or some hybrid format) among participants; the themes of the collective scholarship will also inform a future exhibition.

We seek contributors in two different categories: 1) authors who have ongoing research related to furnishing fabrics seeking a publication venue for an article-length piece of writing and 2) researchers with an interest in this area who would be willing to explore one or more specific textiles in the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection to write a short “object biography.” Please find further details for submission requirements in these categories below.

We acknowledge that furnishing fabrics might have been defined and used in different ways in different historical periods and parts of the globe, so are open to a broad interpretation of the term, but do seek work on textiles that were either made intentionally to be used for some form of furnishing, or produced with less specific intent, but frequently utilized for furnishing. We are interested in fostering a broad conversation on this topic, but are particularly interested in the following themes:

1. Environment: Furnishing fabrics can create and shape environments by demarcating space, contributing warmth, shading or reflecting light, mimicking nature in their colors and patterns, and other ways depending on their material and visual characteristics. They are also determined by—and can have impact upon— the broader environments in which they are designed, made, and consumed.

2. Technology: As noted above, furnishing fabrics themselves can be considered forms of technology in terms of how they mediate environmental characteristics to protect both the human body and forms of shelter from the natural elements. Fabrics are also the objects of changing technology that affects not only the speed and quantity of their production, but also their capacity for conveying design.

3. Design: While technological capacity may have enabled decorative approaches to utilitarian objects, the choices in design were vast and varied over time. Influences in color, motif, and pattern in furnishing fabrics, such as botanical patterns derived from the study of natural history, geometric patterns from mathematics, or specific motifs from historic architecture or other art forms are revealing of the cultural productions of any given time and place.

4. Exchange: The raw materials, production techniques, and designs of furnishing fabrics all testify to the exchange of goods and knowledge between peoples and places over time, as global trade expanded across the early modern and modern periods of history. Furnishing fabrics were used to signify status, whether social, occupational, economic, political, religious, or otherwise; they were also objects of imitation and emulation, especially as new materials and technologies allowed for similar effects to be achieved in new ways.

Proposal Instructions

For both contribution options, we encourage proposals from contributors at all career stages, across a range of roles (eg, academic, curatorial, preservation, practitioner, independent scholar, etc), as long as the focus of your research is historical in nature.

Proposals for both options are due by 1 June 2024. Please send your proposal to furnishingfabrichistory@gmail.com.

Option 1: Proposals for Essays

We are looking for a slate of essays on all aspects of the history of furnishing fabrics. If you have ongoing research (or a concrete plan for research) related to furnishing fabric that could result in an article-length piece of writing, please submit an abstract of 200-300 words, along with your CV. Proposals may cover any historical period or area of the globe, though it is possible that if concentrations of research emerge in the proposals, we will focus more tightly as the project progresses.

Option 2: Proposals for Textile Researcher Roster

In addition to a slate of standalone essays, we are also creating a roster of potential authors who might research and write about one (or more) particular artifact(s) in the Helen Louise Allen Textile Collection; we will work with authors on this roster to match relevant textiles with their research interests. If you have an interest in the history of furnishing fabrics and would like to be included in this roster, please submit your CV, along with a short cover letter explaining your interest in the general topic of histories of furnishing fabrics (ie, how this topic intersects with your other research interests/projects) and any particular areas of interest (eg, historical period, part of the globe, type of design, textile technique, etc).

Please feel free to contact Prof. Marina Moskowitz (Lynn and Gary Mecklenburg Chair in Textile, Material Culture, and Design, University of Wisconsin-Madison) with any questions! You can reach her at mmoskowitz@wisc.edu.