AROUND HOME : Notes on Fireplace Equipment, Dhurrie Rugs and Mirrors : Jacobean Embroidery

MOST TRADITIONAL OR heritage crewel embroidery is based on designs and styles that originated in Great Britain during the reign of James I--the Jacobean era. Just before that, during the 16th Century, Queen Elizabeth had granted a charter allowing London merchants to trade with India. Some of the cotton fabric imported from the East was printed in fanciful floral designs; these inspired the British to try some of their own variations, the most enduring of which became known as the Tree of Life design: exotic birds and animals clinging to branches laden with luscious, otherworldly fruits.

It was the invention of the steel needle that really established the Jacobean era’s lasting importance to the needle arts. Women had previously sewn with bone, wood and ivory. England was the world production center for needles in the late 16th Century, and the embroidery of that period is almost overwhelming in volume and detail.

Those early Jacobean designs still exert a timeless appeal; many modern starter kits (chair seats and pillows, usually) are rendered in Jacobean-like flowers shaded with Long and Short stitches and filled in with graceful Coral stitches and French knots--the same stitches used by Mary, Queen of Scots, to embroider a bed hanging.

Many embroidery books, especially those with chapters on traditional crewel work, offer designs and stitchery instruction. Two well-known examples: “Crewel Embroidery,” by Erica Wilson, and “Heritage Embroidery,” by Elsa Williams, who also markets a line of crewel- embroidery kits. Other crewel kits (prices range from $10 to $30) are available at many Southern California needlework shops, including A Creative Expression in Buena Park and Lace & Needle Arts in West Hills. On Wednesdays and Fridays, a needlework teacher is available (for $5 per student) at Natalie in Los Angeles; the Needlework Patch, Tarzana, can arrange personal instruction on request.