Boutonne Coverlet, Quebec

To mark the Year of the Craft in the Americas, the commemorative stamps dedicated to the rich textile traditions of Canada will be issued April 30. Today, these types of hand-crafted textiles are fashionable and decorative items adding accent, mood and distinction to a room. Occasionally displayed on walls, they have become "objets d'art". Hundreds of years ago they were mostly - if not strictly - made for warmth and comfort. Their decorative function was to cover bed furnishings during daytime. Quilts, coverlets, "ruggs" and bed cover existed from necessity and gained a place in history because of the techniques used, the rarity or the uniqueness of a piece and mostly as a reflection of a people's talent and culture. All of the items selected can be viewed by the public as each is housed in a Canadian public museum collection. Processing wool or other fibre such as flax and cotton, spinning it, and eventually weaving it into cloth were common occupations in 19th century rural Quebec. Clothing and bed furnishings were woven for utilitarian purposes, and although not primarily decorative, did not lack in design, colour and artistic conception. Boutonné is an ancient technique dating back to 2,000 B.C. It was used to pattern linen in Egypt while in Spain and Italy, it added richness to velvets by using gold or silver threads for brocading. The motifs in a boutonné coverlet are obtained by inserting the colour thread into the fabric and pulling it up into loops, creating the desired effects.