A Romanian dress of the 1930s, altered in the 1960s (TRC 2020.3459).A few weeks ago we were contacted by Liesbeth Eymundsson about an embroidered dress that her grandmother, from Oegstgeest in The Netherlands, had bought while visiting Romania in the 1930’s. Ms Eymundsson, who has a husband from Iceland, also offered an embroidered shawl that belonged to her grandmother. This morning the dress and the shawl arrived at the TRC Leiden and they have been added to the TRC Catalogue (nos. TRC 2020.3459 and TRC 2020.3460).
The shawl is a Chinese export item that was popular in the earlier part of the 20th century, a fascinating subject in itself. However, because the dress has an unusual, personal history we have decided to focus on this garment.
The dress is made of a loosely woven cotton material and then hand embroidered with geometric designs in cross stitch and needle weaving in a blue cotton yarn. Originally it came with a separate, matching belt in white and blue.
In 1955 her grandmother entered a knitting competition staged by the Dutch women’s magazine, Margriet. She knitted a greyish blue dress that was inspired by the Romanian garment. To her pleasure she won the competition!
An altered Romanian dress from the 1930s, worn in Denmark in the late 1960s / early 1970s.The end of the 1960’s and early 1970’s saw the Flower Power period and the wearing of exotic garments by the so-called Hippies. The sister of Liesbeth Eymundsson, who lived at the time in Denmark and was the granddaughter of the woman who originally acquired the dress, altered the garment by cutting it at the waist and inserting the belt and then shortening the garment. Fortunately the original embroidery was made into a deep hem and has been preserved.
So this garment represents a traditional Romanian form, a knitting competition winner, as well as a garment worn by a Danish hippie, and now it forms part of the TRC’s collection.
I should add that we are looking for issues of the Margriet from 1955 that (a) announces the competition and (b) gives details of the winner!
Gillian Vogelsang, 7th July 2020.
