Palampore

"The palampore, torn into yellows and reds by the rapiers." Thomas Ackerley, Lord Harwood.

The cotton painted textiles of the Coromandel Coast popularly known as chintz, palampore or pintados, are finely drawn with wax resist--known in Tamil as mezhuguezhuthu (mezhugu=wax, ezhutu=writing) (7)--with a predominant use of chay red and indigo blue dyes.

The allure of the early Indian cloths and their big impact are driven home when we confront the giant among chintz: the furnishing textile known as palampore. Measuring 3 x 4 metres, it served to cover walls or beds in elite European homes in the 18th and early 19th centuries.

One of 30 items that can be viewed interactively online is one of the collection's most distinctive pieces: a palampore, a printed and painted Indian textile of the late seventeenth or early eighteenth century--see http://char.txa.cornell.edu/treasures/treasures.html#pal.

Go to rom.on.ca/media/ podcasts/ to see Shirley Ellis at work on her most challenging project to date: a large palampore, a type of bed curtain or cover made in 18thcentury India.

Or maybe a colourful palampore textile panel from 1700s-era India would be more your style.