Another Peasant Industries piece at the V&A?

The Victoria and Albert Museum have recently added a third item to the 'artist/ maker' of the Haslemere Peasant Industries, although they have caveated it with "possibly, made".  It is intriguing, I wonder what any of you think about whether it was made by the Haslemere Peasant Industries?

Set of valances
possibly made by Haslemere Peasant Industries,
c.1900-1905, Victoria & Albert Museum 

The valance is described as “four embroidered upper valances of linen appliqué.  Ground of mid-blue plain weave linen with a pattern of an angular meandering stem acorn (based upon historic meandering leafy stem borders) bears leaves and nuts/ fruits.  Applique of plain weave linen in cream mid-brown, green and grey, pale blue and dark blue satin stitched silks secure outlines.  Lined with natural linen, a variety of fastening tapes are attached to the top edge.  The ground is pieced in places and drawing of pattern is occasionally visible on the blue ground.”   All four valances appear to be slightly different sizes, reflecting the individuality of each hand-made piece.  The four measurements are given as:

• 21.5cm x 182cm
• 22cm x 213cm
• 20cm x 205cm
• 23cm x 214cm

As they are described as upper valances, I presume they would either have been made for the top of a four poster bed or for windows.  I wonder which?

Interestingly the valances were given to the V&A by "JFW Morton and Courtaulds Ltd", in I believe 1977.  The linen on linen and satin stitching seems consistent with Haslemere's peasant tapestries.  As does the  drawing of the pattern being "occasionally visible" because it is well-documented that the tapestries were made by amateurs.  The green, yellow and orange colours of the fruits are similar to the colours in one of the Victoria & Albert Museum's other tapestries, The Spies (by Godfrey Blount, c.1900), a simple comparison shows them not be identical.  Unfortunately, most of the pictures of the tapestries are in black and white, so it is difficult to find many colour comparisons.

detail of The Spies,V&A Museum
(Blount, G., c.1900)

detail of Set of valances, 

possibly Haslemere Peasant Industries

V&A Museum (c.1900-1905)

The leaves appear to be horse chestnut leaves.  Godfrey Blount illustrates these in Arbor Vitae in his 'Classification of Leaves' chapter.   

from Arbor Vitae (Blount, G.,
Arthur Fifield, 1910, 3rd edition)

Blount's writing on the composition of 'the spiral' lends some understanding to the design.  Blount identifies different leaf shapes, of which the horse chesnut is one, and outlines the “four main positions of the petiole in regard to the spiral, and they apply equally well to most kinds of spiral and almost any form of leaf….I need not suggest, I should certainly fail to enumerate, how many delightful varieties of pattern can be based on these four methods; and even if we limited outselves to the narrowest paths that tradition allows, and refused to exercise any independent imagination, with our fifteen leaves and our four methods of insertion we should be able to supply our friends with a choice of at least sixty patterns if they happened to want to carve a lintel or embroider a table-cloth.

from Arbor Vitae (Blount, G.,
Arthur Fifield, 1910, 3rd edition)

"Once more let me warn you to avoid falling into any mechanical or methodical habit.  Remember that your original spiral may be gracefully Greek, or stiffly Gothic – as open as a tidal stream, or as sinuous as a mountain torrent.  Keep an open mind, too, in the matter of colour.  Every leaf is not green in Nature, nor every stalk brown.  Much may happen to the petiole itself before it reaches the leaf.  It may indulge itself in an extra twist or two to make up for a lack of agility in its parent stalk, or to show its own lightheartedness; or else it may become a minor and subordinate spiral, dividing itself and throwing off two or more leaves instead of one…But however diverse and replete our patterns become, we must always maintain their conventional arrangement; and however much we borrow ideas from Nature, we must never, except for purposes of study, copy her examples.  To do that, and call it Art, is rank blasphemy.  With such restrictions as these, the deeper our acquaintance with Nature is, the more interesting our patterns will become; but our knowledge must pass through the alembic of our imagination before it becomes Art."

rotated picture of Set of valances
possibly made by Haslemere Peasant Industries,
c.1900-1905, Victoria & Albert Museum 

from Arbor Vitae (Blount, G.,
Arthur Fifield, 1910, 3rd edition)

The location of the leaves and fruits are at the identical positions to those illustrated in Arbor Vitae.  If the leaves are horse chestnut, it would appear logical for the yellow and orange fruits to be representing the spiky horse chestnut seeds, which tend to be yellowy green, but then as Blount says, we should not be copying the examples of nature.   He writes that "….the bud and the fruit are simple enough to be used with great effect.  The first appearance of the bud is a knobbly protuberance on the side of the spiral.  Its first duty is to blance a leaf on the opposite side, or humbly help to fill an empty interstice whenever it may occur rather than to pose as itself the main feature of an interval

from Arbor Vitae (Blount, G.,
Arthur Fifield, 1910, 3rd edition)

from Arbor Vitae (Blount, G.,
Arthur Fifield, 1910, 3rd edition)

"…Some buds – especially those of large trees, such as the horse-chestnut, lime, and sycamore – develop into crosses or variously graceful shape, and are for that reason particularly valuable and suggestive."

Blount describes the place of fruit in the spiral “The flower too is really the apex of the tree, the crowning glory of the plant.  Shorn of stalk and leaf, like the prize blossoms in a flower show, it is on a surfeit of luxury, and a sin against good taste.  Such reasons as these prevent the flower from often taking the place of the lead in the spiral.  But where the flower fails, the fruit succeeds admirably, either as an occasional alternative to the leaf, or even…entirely as a substitute for it. 

from Arbor Vitae (Blount, G.,
Arthur Fifield, 1910, 3rd edition)

...Here too, the squirrel’s harvest of homely nuts, with all the rustic fruits of our forest trees, acorns and chestnuts, beech mast and pine cones, will have their place…Surely here, if anywhere, is the clasp of Nature’s necklace; here at once her beginning and her end.  Fuller than the leaf, simpler than the flower, the seed and the fruit are the first palpably solid forms we must learn to use.  Full of mystery; dead but how living!  Inert, but how active!  A grain of mustard seed to-day, but to-morrow the birds of the air shall make a town of it!...It is a source of myth and a motive of decoration, as true now as it ever was, and one that cannot fail to excite our keenest interest while the mystery of life remains, as may it ever, unsolved."  

The mystery of the origin of the Set of valances may not be conclusively solved, but they do appear to me to be authentic Haslemere Peasant tapestries.

from Arbor Vitae (Blount, G.,
Arthur Fifield, 1910, 3rd edition)