Sewing with Velvet Session 2: The History of Velvet & Manufacturing

There are several theories as to where velvet originated. Though it has strong ties to European nobility, it's most commonly believed to have originated from Eastern and middle Eastern culture. Iraq was one of the first major producers of velvet as well as Egypt. Pieces of velvet found in Egypt in Cairo date back to 2000 BC. The weaving process used to create velvet originally was so complex and time consuming it was only available to royalty and the very rich. Some pieces of velvet have also been found in China dating back to several old dynasties as far back as 400 BC. Those fabrics typically made from silk, China being a major producer of silk at the time. Europeans started exploring the Eastern and middle Eastern areas and once they caught sight of this beautiful fabric they immediately entered it into trade bringing it back to Europe, where it was widely popular. Italy was one of the first countries in Europe to create a velvet industry. And it supplied velvet to the rest of Europe from the 12th to the 14th centuries. The Renaissance was a high point in velvet production from about 1400 to 1600 there was a huge increase in velvet production, especially the intricately patterned velvets. It was a high-end luxury good used in clothing, upholstery, curtains even wallpaper. And as mentioned, Italy was a major producer of velvet. Spain also had a booming velvet industry and the types of velvet that came out of this production period were extremely decadent woven with silk and threads of precious metals such as silver and gold. Customers for this type of luxury included the church and rich families who wanted a customized textiles such as textiles featuring their coat of arms. The industrial revolution changed everything. The manufacturing process became mechanized and as velvet became cheaper to produce, easier to produce it became more widely available to everyone. But as it had been associated with royalty and nobility for 4,000 years, that association stuck and through the twenties and thirties, it was still used in clothing favored by the upper-class. Nowadays with the advent of synthetic fabrics the process to create velvet has become even cheaper and it is starting to become even more widely used in daily sewing for everyone. Now, the weaving process to create velvet is what makes it distinct. When we say velvet that is what we're talking about. A fabric that was woven in this specific way. So velvet is, it is a woven fabric characterized by the nap on the right side, which are loops or cut threads to create the tufts, which is called the pile or the nap on the right side of the fabric. Typically historically velvet was woven with silk but you'll find a wide variety of different fiber contents now and lots of blends as well. So blends of synthetic fabrics, rayon and acetate and also blends of natural fibers such as you'll find cotton and still some silk velvets are available. So velvet is typically woven in a double cloth which means they weave two lengths of fabric at the same time with right sides together. And the loops or the tufts that create the pile are created by an extra warp thread that's woven through both fabrics at the same time. And the warp threads are the threads that run parallel to the salvage so the long threads are the warp threads. And so here's the double cloth, here's one layer of fabric and the other and the extra warp thread is woven through. And then a knife comes in afterward to cut those extra threads and that creates the tufts, the pile. So there are a wide variety of velvet fabrics available and velvet is one of those fabrics that manufacturers love to put finishing techniques on either during the weaving process there are slight variations to the weaving process that can create different looks or after the velvet is woven, finishing techniques such as embossing or twisting the fabric to create crushed velvet. There are a lot of different techniques to create slightly different looks on velvet which will create slightly different velvet varieties that are called by different names which we will go over in the next session called velvet varieties.