Blended textiles: Flax, hemp and cotton in 19th century France.

Male hemp plants, flax and cotton

Historical research about textiles made from bast fibers has progressed in recent years broadening our perspectives of people’s needs for textile raw materials. Despite this, analyses of textiles made of mixed fibers from a variety of plants have not received sufficient attention. Textiles were often made of blends of different plant fibers, which was during historical time common but is rarely mentioned in research, compounding the difficulty of accurate fiber identification. Fibers could be blended as the yarn was spun, of yarns different fibers were woven into a single fabric, and various fabrics were assembled in a range of everyday textiles. Without relying on proper analysis protocols, it is difficult of distinguish different bast fibers, and this has resulted in the misidentification of textiles in museum collections.

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This blue traditional French long shirt was made in the late 19th or early 20th century, a time when everyday textiles were made from locally grown flax and/or hemp, but also mixed with imported cotton. The shirt has a main fabric of flax, while the back, cuffs and sleeve gussets are of hemp. The collar and shoulder reinforcement are of a commercial cotton fabric. These three plants were used in all kinds of everyday garments, and in France right up until the beginning of the 20th century. Not least, hemp was a common textile plant which also can be seen in botanical prints from the period. Notably, it was male hemp plants that were used for textiles, which is also seen in this illustration. The corresponding plants in several East Asian countries during the same period were ramie and/or hemp and cotton. All of the plants mentioned can be distinguished by the Herzog test (manually fiber-twist test or with a microscope).

Read more about blended plant textiles and how they can be distinguished, you will find the article by Skoglund in journal TEXTILES Cloth and Cultures: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14759756.2022.2053276

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