The two-color woven-in trapeze-swingers (above) entered the world as commercial fabric in 1883. The pink silk grosgrain with woven-in circus-horses (below) came along more than half a century later, when couture powerhouse Elsa Schiaparelli used it (along with sculptural buttons in the shape of acrobats wearing little blue shorts) for a typically whimsical and elaborate blouse/jacket garment in 1938. Both sets of images come from Philadelphia University's
Design Center (I swore
here to stop exploiting their online textile collections, but I lied.)
