Hand knitted cap from Peru, late-20th century (TRC 2021.1917).We have just had a donation of textiles, garments and headwear from the Hobijn family here in Leiden. The items were collected over many years by Hilde van der Linden's parents-in-law, Joop en May Hobijn-Roth, who were passionate about textiles. The items come from many parts of the world, literally from Indonesia to Guatemala via China, India and Africa and include a wide variety of techniques.
The first group, in fact, was catalogued this morning (Thursday) and include fourteen pairs of knitted socks that show a variety of heel and toe techniques, as well as patterns and colour combinations (TRC 2021.1936a-b – TRC 2021.1949a-b). One of them, TRC 2021.1940a-b, has a delicate lacey design plus toes with a trellis work enclosing rosettes.
Straw or grass hat from West Africa, perhaps Togo, decorated with strips of leather (TRC 2021.1962).There are also several items of headwear, including eight Peruvian hand knitted caps (TRC 2021.1912 – TRC 2021.1919) that are ‘easy’ to identify. In contrast, there are two items that have proven to be more elusive.
One of them (TRC 2021.1962) is a straw or grass hat with a tall crown and decorated with strips of coloured leather. It has been tentatively identified as coming from Togo and made for a hunter. The other item (TRC 2021.1963) looks like a metal helmet from a distance (it actually looks like a British Tommy helmet), but it is made out of a piece of very thick leather. Does anyone know where these last two examples of headwear come from?
Leather hat or helmet with an unknown origin (TRC 2021.1963).Over the next five or so days we will be adding a series of Indonesian batiks, Indian embroideries, hand woven and embroidered shoulder bags from the Hobijn donation to the online catalogue.
In addition, we will be adding some Western garments from the same donation, including a lovely silk top from the late 19th century and a velvet waistcoat with glass buttons of a similar date.
In other words there is a wide variety of interesting and colourful items that are an asset to the TRC Collection!
Gillian Vogelsang, Director TRC, 17 July 2021
