Weaving the Fall Harvest: Straw Work– A Victorian and Edwardian Background


Photograph of the sign that reads Museum of Straw Work. The sky behind the sign is blue, foliage and flowers sit in front of the sign.
Museum of Straw Work by Evelyn Simak Wikimedia Commons Image License

A result of grain harvests, straw was used in the Victorian and Edwardian ages for a selection of functional and attractive purposes. This sort of handicraft was usually called straw job. A variety of straws were made use of in straw job consisting of oat , barley , wheat, rye and rice straws. Transforming the dried out stems of harvested grain plants right into stunning and useful things was a craft practiced for centuries, and still has actually dedicated lovers today maintaining the background and methods of straw job.

Illustration in black, grey, and white of a Welsh Barley Sheaf known as a Geifr, from the book “The First Principles of Good Cookery.” The top of the wheat is bending to one side the rest of the wheat stands in a circle held midway with wheat making it more narrow than the wheat resting on the ground.
Welsh Barley by Girl Llanover, very first published (1867 Wikimedia Commons Image License

One of the most recommended kind of straw for straw work was wheat straw. Cassell’s Household Guide , a residential encyclopedia released in 1869 specified on why wheat straw was thought about the very best product for this craft.

Wheat straw, which has a large amount of silica, or flint, is far tougher and much more highly refined than that of any various other of the cereals. […] (p. 120

Different types of wheat: Wheat, as Triticum hybernum (modern T. aestivum, probably, Oats, Avena sativa, Barley, Hordeum distichon, Rye, Secale cereale, Vernal grass, Anthoxanthum odoratum, Cotton grass, Eriophorum angustifolium, Bull-rush, as Scirpus lacustris (modern Schoenoplectus lacustris), Meadow fox-tail grass, Eriophorum angustifolium, Cat’s-tail grass, Phleum pratense, Fiorin, or Orcheston long grass, Agrostis stolonifera, Canary grass, Phalaris Canariensis grass Molinia caerulea.
Useful Expertise: or a Familiar Account of the Different Productions of Nature, Mineral, Veggie, and Pet, which are Chiefly Employed for making use of Guy. Quantity II: Veggies: Task Gutenberg (1865 by Rev. William Bingley Wikimedia Commons Image License

Some types of straw expensive job were divided by social class. Straw weaving , the …

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