Exhibition of the Museum of Chuvash Embroidery

About exhibition

Embroidery is the calling card of Chuvashia, attracting genuine interest and admiration. The museum's most valuable and ancient exhibits include an 18th-century women's shirt with three pairs of chest patterns called kĕskĕ, a bride's coverlet, and groom's scarves embroidered with double-sided stitches. The exhibition begins with an account of Bulgarian–Chuvash parallels in ornamentation. Subsequent displays describe runic signs in embroidery and jewelry, ancient Chinese pictograms preserved on the oldest wedding shirt of the 18th century, and materials discussing parallels between Chuvash patterns and the ornamentation of pottery made by ancient farmers of the southern regions of Central Asia. The most prized exhibit is an embroidered map of the Chuvash ASSR, made for the All-Russian Agricultural Exhibition of 1939 by workers of the Algeshevskaya factory 'Paha tĕrĕ'. Separate stands are dedicated to leading researchers of Chuvash folk embroidery and to contemporary masters of the craft.