Audiotour Textiles

Textiles

In the small section dedicated to period clothing, recently established, it is possible to admire two delightful Andrienne-type female dresses, composed of a "petticoat" and a surcoat, made by Sicilian tailors in the last quarter of the eighteenth century with fabrics decorated with French-made floral motifs. The two female models are accompanied by a male livery in woolen cloth with velvet braids intended for the servants of the aristocratic families of the island, made in Sicily between the end of the eighteenth century and the beginning of the nineteenth century. The section dedicated to textiles is completed by a small collection of sacred wallpapers, an expression of the creativity and technical expertise of Sicilian workers between the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Among the specimens on display, the splendid eighteenth-century Ternary from the Franciscan monastery of the Badia Grande stands out, consisting of a chasuble and two dalmatics embroidered in paint stitch with gold, silver and polychrome silk threads.  On its ivory-coloured surfaces, floral varieties, allegorical figures of virtue and scenes from the life of Saints Louis IX and Elizabeth of Hungary emerge in a bright explosion of colours.