Bizarre Silks

Bizarre silks were woven on the Drawloom. These fabrics were often brocaded against a subtle, one-color damask background; the layering of patterns and the manipulation of color, texture, and light added visual interest.

In the 17th century western lampas production was woven as a luxury good in silk-weaving centers such as Venice, Spitalfields London and Lyon France, bizarre silks were used primarily for clothing for the court and upper classes and for ecclesiastical vestments.

At the height of the fashion, the average repeat of a bizarre silk pattern was 27 inches (69 cm) high and ten inches (26 cm) wide, repeating twice across the width of the fabric.

Drawloom

A Drawloom is a handloom for weaving figured cloth. In a drawloom, a "figure harness" is used to control each warp thread separately. A Drawloom requires two operators, the weaver and an assistant called a "drawboy" to manage the figure harness.

Lampas Brocade is often the term used for either a Lampas weave or a Brocade weave they are very similar

Lampas is a type of luxury fabric with a background weft (a "ground weave") with a supplementary weft (the "pattern wefts") laid on top and forming a design, sometimes a "brocading weft", which is when extra wefts and floats are added to the weave, especially when using metallic thread.

Lampas is typically woven in silk, and often has gold and silver thread enrichment. Lampas weaves were developed around 1000 CE (Christian Europe).

Brocade is a type of richly decorative weaving often made in colored silks and with or without gold and silver threads. The name, comes from Italian “broccato” meaning "embossed cloth,"

Brocade is typically woven on a draw loom. It is also woven with a supplementary weft technique, that is, the ornamental brocading is produced by a supplementary non-structural weft, in addition to the standard weft that holds the warp threads together.

The purpose of this is to give the appearance that the weave was embroidered on.

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