The history of the pincushion is a presentation for a lesson on technology (grade 5) on the topic. History of pincushions Municipal budgetary educational institution

Used in sewing, eliminating the possibility of their loss during operation.

Story

In ancient times, when fabric just began to spread, needle beds were made using any fabric and paper that were interchanged. But only rich people could afford them. Later, pincushions were made of wood or ivory, and between them there was velvet material where pins and needles were stored.

Pincushions

Pincushion cushions are often created by needlewomen for decorative purposes. They can be of a simple shape - a square, a circle, a heart - or complex: in the form of a handbag, an animal figurine, a flower. A simple homemade pincushion can be made from cardboard, padded material such as cotton wool or foam rubber, and fabric. Pincushions are decorated with embroidery, appliqué, and knitting can be used instead of fabric.

Making a pincushion is a popular activity in preschool craft classes. A hand-made needle case is then used to teach the child how to handle things carefully - after class you need to put your needles in it.

Ready-made needle beds

Case pincushions can be of different shapes. The mushroom case is used not only for storing needles, but also for darning.

Magnetic needle beds can be made in the form of a stand, or in the form of a box with a magnet inside.

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Notes

Excerpt characterizing Pincushion

The friends were silent. Neither one nor the other began to speak. Pierre glanced at Prince Andrei, Prince Andrei rubbed his forehead with his small hand.
“Let’s go have dinner,” he said with a sigh, getting up and heading to the door.
They entered the elegantly, newly, richly decorated dining room. Everything, from napkins to silver, earthenware and crystal, bore that special imprint of novelty that happens in the household of young spouses. In the middle of dinner, Prince Andrei leaned on his elbow and, like a man who has had something on his heart for a long time and suddenly decides to speak out, with an expression of nervous irritation in which Pierre had never seen his friend before, he began to say:
– Never, never get married, my friend; Here's my advice to you: don't get married until you tell yourself that you did everything you could, and until you stop loving the woman you chose, until you see her clearly; otherwise you will make a cruel and irreparable mistake. Marry an old man, good for nothing... Otherwise, everything that is good and lofty in you will be lost. Everything will be spent on little things. Yes Yes Yes! Don't look at me with such surprise. If you expect something from yourself in the future, then at every step you will feel that everything is over for you, everything is closed except for the living room, where you will stand on the same level as a court lackey and an idiot... So what!...
He waved his hand energetically.
Pierre took off his glasses, causing his face to change, showing even more kindness, and looked at his friend in surprise.
“My wife,” continued Prince Andrei, “is a wonderful woman.” This is one of those rare women with whom you can be at peace with your honor; but, my God, what I wouldn’t give now not to be married! I’m telling you this alone and first, because I love you.
Prince Andrei, saying this, looked even less like than before that Bolkonsky, who was lounging in Anna Pavlovna’s chair and, squinting through his teeth, spoke French phrases. His dry face was still trembling with the nervous animation of every muscle; the eyes, in which the fire of life had previously seemed extinguished, now shone with a radiant, bright shine. It was clear that the more lifeless he seemed in ordinary times, the more energetic he was in these moments of almost painful irritation.

Small things are stored in it -
Those that are very prickly;
Some have it on a carnation,
I have it on the shelf.
Skilled craftsmen
Schoolboys and schoolgirls
For mother's holiday
Soft... (needle beds).

Every person keeps pins and needles in a pincushion. The needle is the oldest invention of man. It was invented even before the wheel. A pincushion is a simple and useful invention found in every housewife. It was used by both peasants and noble people.

It is difficult to say exactly when the pincushion appeared, but the stages of its development are known. Unlike today, many centuries ago a needle was considered a luxury. Therefore, there was a need for its safe and careful storage.

In the 15th century, containers made of silver and ivory appeared. At the same time, needle cases began to be stuffed with wool and covered with fabric.

In the 16th century, it became fashionable to attach pincushions to silver and wooden stands.

In the 17th and 18th centuries, pincushions were made from high quality fabrics: linen, satin and decorated with embroidery.

In the 19th century, pincushions became more of a decorative element in the form of an egg glass or a basket on a metal, glass or porcelain stand.

At the beginning of the 20th century, pincushion pincushions became popular. The structure was attached to the table to prevent the fabric from slipping.

In the Ethnographic Museum. IN AND. Romanov has a sewing pincushion, which was used in the Mari region at the end of the 19th – beginning of the 20th centuries. The pincushion is located on a stand of four vertical supports, which are decorated with handmade helical carvings. Under the stand there is a compact box with a lid for small sewing accessories. It closes with a small pinwheel. On one side of the box there is a continuation of the design for the pincushion. This is an expanding flat board on which the embroiderer sits.

Everyone did needlework. It was customary to wear embroidery when visiting people. And the needles needed to be stored somewhere. People called needle beds needle cases. This item was highly revered. Mothers gave pincushions to their daughters. When a girl got married, she took the pincushion with her to her husband’s house. The richer the family was, the more expensive the needle case was.

And now pincushions can be completely different: sewn, embroidered in the shape of flowers, hats or animals, in a jar, travel-sized, and, of course, antique.

Pincushions are a wonderful souvenir that can be used as an accessory for sewing and embroidery, as well as for decorative purposes.

Researcher at the Accounting and Storage Department
Tayukova Lyudmila Vladimirovna.
Photographs of items from the funds.

Pincushion - seamstress, early 19th - 20th centuries

Pincushion, beginning of the 19th - 20th centuries

The needle bar is screwed to the sewing machine

Modern pincushion

Please rehabilitate me for the previous topic. I found a neutral topic – pincushions.

I don’t sew myself - it’s not my thing. And my friend sews. So, I’m walking around the net and suddenly I come across a photo of a very comfortable, in my opinion, pincushion that fits on your hand. I searched again and... found it. I bring to your attention a small pile of cute pincushions. But first, a little history.

The most ancient invention of man is the needle. She is perhaps older than the wheel! Primitive clothing made from thick, poorly dressed skins was sewn with animal sinews, thin plant vines or palm leaf veins, as in Africa, and ancient needles were also thick and clumsy. Over time, people learned how to dress hides more finely, and they needed a finer needle. They learned to mine metal and needles began to be made from bronze. Some of the samples found are so small that something like horsehair was apparently inserted into them, because not a single vein that could withstand the load would simply fit into them.

The first iron needles were found in Manching, in Bavaria, and date back to the 3rd century BC. It is possible, however, that these were “imported” samples. At that time, the ear (hole) was not yet known and the blunt tip was simply bent into a small ring. The ancient states also knew the iron needle, and in Ancient Egypt already in the 5th century BC. Embroidery was actively used. The needles found on the territory of Ancient Egypt are practically no different in appearance from modern ones. The first steel needle was found in China; it dates back to around the 10th century AD.

It is believed that needles were brought to Europe around the 8th century AD. Moorish tribes who lived in the territories of modern Morocco and Algeria. According to other sources, this was done by Arab merchants in the 14th century. In any case, steel needles were known there much earlier than in Europe. With the invention of Damascus steel, needles began to be made from it. This happened in 1370. That year, the first workshop community specializing in needles and other sewing items appeared in Europe. There was still no eye in those needles. And they were made exclusively by hand using the forging method.

Starting from the 12th century, the method of drawing wire using a special drawing plate became known in Europe, and needles began to be made on a much larger scale. (More precisely, the method existed for a long time, since ancient times, but was then conveniently forgotten). The appearance of the needles has improved significantly. Nuremberg (Germany) became the center of needle craft. A revolution in needlework took place in the 16th century, when the method of wire drawing was mechanized using a hydraulic motor invented in Germany. The main production was concentrated in Germany, Nuremberg and Spain. “Spanish peaks” - that’s what the needles were called at that time - were even exported. Later - in 1556 - England took over the baton with its industrial revolution, and the main production was concentrated there. Before this, needles were very expensive; rarely did any master have more than two needles. Now their prices have become more reasonable.

Since the 16th century, an unexpected use was found for the needle - etchings began to be made with its help. Etching is an independent type of engraving in which a design is scratched with a needle on a metal board covered with a layer of varnish. The acid in which the board is then immersed corrodes the grooves, and they become more distinct. Then the board acts as a stamp. The needles that were used for this type of art are similar to sewing needles, only without an eye and their tips are sharpened in the form of a cone, blade, or cylinder. Without strong steel needles, etching would hardly have been born. Thanks to the needle, the world in the 16th century recognized such German artists as A. Dürer, D. Hopfer, in the 17th century - the Spaniard H. Ribera, the Dutch A. Van Deyak, A. van Ostade, the greatest of the etchers, Rembrandt van Rijn. A. Watteau and F. Boucher worked in France, F. Goya in Spain, and G. B. Tiepolo in Italy. A.F. Zubov, M.F. Kazakov, V.I. Bazhenov worked in Russia. The needle was often used to draw popular prints, including folk pictures from the time of the Patriotic War of 1812, glorifying, for example, the cavalry guard maiden Durova or the partisan poet Denis Davydov, illustrations for books, and caricatures. This technique is still alive today and is used by many contemporary artists.

But let's return to the sewing needle. Real mechanized production opened in 1785, Europe and America were flooded with new needles. Fun fact: Treasure seekers recently discovered a huge wooden chest with the inscription "San Fernando" on the Florida coast under a thick layer of sand. They looked up the archives and discovered that such a ship actually sank on the way from Mexico to Spain in the middle of the 18th century. On board, judging by the inventory, there were goods worth about 150 million silver pesos - a fabulous sum at that time. When the chest was opened, an unexpected sight was revealed to the greedy eyes of the treasure hunters: the chest was full of tens of thousands of sailor needles for patching sails.

In 1850, the British came up with special needle machines that made it possible to make the familiar eye in a needle. England takes first place in the world in the production of needles, becomes a monopolist and for a very long time has been a supplier of this necessary product to all countries. Before this, needles were cut from wire with varying degrees of mechanization, but the English machine not only stamped needles, but also made the ears itself. The British quickly realized that good quality needles that do not deform, do not break, do not rust, are well polished, are highly valued, and this product is a win-win. The whole world has understood what a convenient steel needle is, which does not touch the fabric with its homemade eye in the form of a loop.

A needle is that thing that has always, at all times, been in any home: whether it belongs to a poor man or to a king. During the numerous wars in which our planet is so rich, each soldier always had his own needle, rewound with thread: sew on a button, put on a patch. This tradition has survived to this day: all military personnel have several needles with different thread colors: white for sewing on collars, black and protective for sewing on buttons, shoulder straps, and for minor repairs.

Literally until the 19th century, everyone sewed clothes for themselves, because everyone knew how to do needlework, regardless of class. Even noble ladies considered it obligatory to come to visit with handicrafts - embroidery, beads, sewing. Despite the invention of the sewing machine at the beginning of the 19th century, hand sewing and embroidery continued to remain incredibly popular; works of sewing art created in the literal sense of the word never cease to amaze us with their beauty even now.

Many paintings by famous artists are dedicated to needlewomen. Suffice it to recall “A Peasant Girl Embroidering” by A.G. Venetsianov, a number of paintings by V.A. Tropinin - “Gold Seamstress”, “Beading Stitches”.

By the way, the first steel needles appeared in Russia only in the 17th century, although the age of bone needles found in Russia (the village of Kostenki, Voronezh region) is determined by experts to be approximately 40 thousand years. Older than a Cro-Magnon thimble!

Steel needles were brought from Germany by Hanseatic merchants. Before this, in Rus' they used bronze, and later iron, needles; for rich customers they were forged from silver (gold, by the way, has not caught on anywhere for making needles - the metal is too soft, it bends and breaks). In Tver, already in the 16th century, there was the production of so-called “Tver needles”, thick and thin, which successfully competed on the Russian market with needles from Lithuania. They were sold in thousands in Tver and other cities. “However, even in such a major metalworking center as Novgorod, in the 80s of the 16th century there were only seven needle holders and one pin maker,” writes historian E.I. Zaozerskaya.

The own industrial production of needles in Russia began with the light hand of Peter I. In 1717, he issued a decree on the construction of two needle factories in the villages of Stolbtsy and Kolentsy on the Prona River (modern Ryazan region). They were built by the merchant brothers Ryumin and their “colleague” Sidor Tomilin. Russia by that time did not have its own labor market, since it was an agricultural country, so there was a catastrophic shortage of workers. Peter gave permission to hire them “wherever they find them and at whatever price they want.” By 1720, 124 students were recruited, mostly townspeople's children from craft and trading families in the suburbs of Moscow. Studying and work were so hard that rarely anyone could stand it.

There is a legend, passed down from generation to generation in the factory working environment (the production of needles still exists in the old place), how Peter, having once visited the factories, demonstrated his blacksmithing skills to the workers.

Since then, the steel needle has firmly entered the life of the poor, becoming a real symbol of hard work. There was even a saying: “A village stands by a needle and a harrow.” What a poor man! These needles were also used by Peter’s unfortunate wife Evdokia Fedorovna Lopukhina, who whiled away her time embroidering during her almost thirty years of imprisonment in the monastery of the Shlisselburg fortress. When the queen gave her grandson Peter II a ribbon and a star on the occasion of her release, she said: “I, a sinner, brought it down with my own hands.”

After the invention of the neck machine, a need arose for machine needles. They differ from hand needles primarily in that the eye is on a sharp tip, and the blunt tip is turned into a kind of pin for securing it in the machine. The design of machine needles changed with the development of the design of the machine; along the way, various additions and improvements were made, such as the grooves in which the thread is hidden. Nowadays, only a few countries have established mass production of machine needles. A few kilograms of this high-quality product can cost more than a luxury car! And making an ordinary needle is not an easy task, despite all the achievements of civilization.

The needle has become part of everyday life so long ago and firmly that it even began to carry a certain sacred meaning. It is not for nothing that so many signs, fortune telling, prohibitions, fairy tales and legends are dedicated to her. And there are many more questions about the needle than about other items. Why is Koshchei's death at the end of a needle? Why has the needle never had a decorative function, like most items of clothing and accessories, including a pin? Why can’t a needle be inserted into clothing that is currently being worn? Yes, our grandmothers forbade sticking needles into anything for storage! Why can’t you sew up your clothes, but must be taken off first? Why should you never pick up a needle on the street, and why is it generally not recommended to use someone else’s? Why are love spells cast and the most terrible damage inflicted using a needle? Why does any housewife carefully store and hide her needles, even though she has dozens of them and they cost pennies? There are a lot of these “whys”, if you bring them all, and even remember the signs with dreams, no blog will be enough.

There is one amazing Buddhist ceremony in Japan called the Broken Needle Festival. The festival has been taking place throughout Japan for over a thousand years on December 8th. Previously, only tailors took part in it, today - anyone who knows how to sew. A special tomb is built for the needles, in which scissors and thimbles are placed. A bowl of tofu, ritual bean curd, is placed in the center, and all the needles that have broken or bent over the past year are placed in it. After this, one of the seamstresses says a special prayer of gratitude to the needles for their good service. The tofu with the needles is then wrapped in paper and lowered into the sea.

Nowadays, every housewife has a lot of sewing needles, and they are all different, have different sizes and shapes depending on what they are sewing with (there are twelve sizes in total). There are needles not only for sewing and embroidery, but also for saddlery, furriers, sailing: For ordinary sewing and basting, long thin needles are used; gold-plated ones are well suited for embroidery - they literally “fly” through the fabric.

For those who embroider with both hands, there are very convenient double-ended needles. They have a hole in the middle and allow you to pierce the fabric without turning the needle over. To embroider with floss threads, the needle must be chrome-plated with a gold-plated eye, so that, thanks to the contrast, it is easy to thread colored threads. The eye for such needles is made longer so that the thread slides freely when sewing and does not fray when passing through the fabric.

For darning, needles with a long eye are also used, but they are much thicker and always have a sharp tip. For sewing wool, the tip is made blunt so as not to tear the thick fibers.

For beads and bugles, the needle should have a thickness of almost a hair and it should be the same throughout its entire length, and the needle for leather should be thick and with a triangular sharpening of the tip.

Tapestry needles are made with a large eye and a rounded end, which does not pierce, but pushes the fabric fibers apart. Similar needles are also used for cross stitch. The thickest (from 2 to 5 mm) and longest (70-200 mm) are “gypsy” needles, also known as bag needles, used for coarse fabrics such as canvas, burlap, tarpaulin, etc. They may be curved.

There are special needles used in the manufacture of carpets and non-woven textile materials. It is no coincidence that one of the methods for obtaining them is called needle-punched.

There are needles for the visually impaired; they are very easy to thread, because... The eyelet is made according to the principle of a carbine. Even so-called “platinum needles” appeared, made of stainless steel and coated with a thin layer of platinum, which reduces friction on the fabric. These needles reduce sewing time and are resistant to oils and acids, so they do not leave stains.

Because People constantly used this item and came up with various superstitions about the needle.

Pricking a finger with a needle was considered a way for a girl to listen to someone’s praise.
If a person has lost a needle without a thread, he will have to meet his loved one, and if the loss was with a thread, he will have to part with him.
If you hold two needles crosswise at the level of your heart, this will protect you from the evil eye and damage.
Stepping on a needle is a bad omen: you will be disappointed in your friends and quarrel with them.
Accidentally sitting on a needle means experiencing love disappointment and someone's betrayal.
Needles cannot be given as a gift - to a quarrel; If you still give it, lightly prick him in the hand.

Whether you believe in omens or not, everyone believes that a needle is an irreplaceable thing in our home.

Machine needles do not lag behind simple ones and are also divided not only by thickness, but also by purpose. There are regular, universal needles, and there are also special needles for sewing denim, knitwear and leather. Their noses are sharpened in a special way for this purpose.

However, it would be wrong to think that needles are only for sewing. We talked about some - etchings - at the beginning. But there are also gramophone ones (or rather, there were), which made it possible to “remove” sound from the grooves of a record: There are needle bearings as a type of roller bearings. In the 19th century there was even a so-called “needle gun”. When the trigger was pulled, a special needle pierced the paper bottom of the cartridge and ignited the percussion composition of the primer. The “needle gun,” however, did not last very long and was supplanted by the rifle.

But the most common “non-sewing” needles are medical needles. Although why not sewing? The surgeon uses them to sew. Not just fabric, but people. God forbid that we get to know these needles in practice, but in theory. In theory this is interesting.

To begin with, needles in medicine were used only for injections, starting around 1670. However, the syringe in the modern sense of the word appeared only in 1853. It’s a little late, considering that the prototype of the syringe was invented by the French mathematician, physicist and philosopher Blaise Pascal already in 1648. But then the world did not accept his invention. For what? What microbes? What injections? Devilishness and nothing more.

The injection needle is a hollow stainless steel tube with the end cut at an acute angle. We all received injections, so everyone remembers the not very pleasant sensations of “acquaintance” with such a needle. Now you can no longer be afraid of injections, because... There are already painless microneedles that do not affect nerve endings. Such a needle, as doctors say, is not something you would immediately find in a haystack, but even on a smooth table.

A needle in the form of a hollow tube is used, by the way, not only for injections, but also for suctioning gases and liquids, for example, from the chest cavity during inflammation.

Surgeons use “sewing” medical needles for stitching (“darning” in their professional slang) tissues and organs. These needles are not straight, as we are used to, but curved. Depending on the purpose, they are semicircular, triangular, semi-oval. At the end there is usually a split eyelet for the thread, the surface of the needle is chromed or nickel plated so that the needle does not rust. There are also platinum surgical needles. Ophthalmic (eye) needles, which are used to perform operations, for example, on the cornea of the eye, have a thickness of a fraction of a millimeter. It is clear that such a needle can only be used using a microscope.

It is impossible not to mention one more medical needle - for acupuncture. In China, this method of treatment was known even before our era. The meaning of acupuncture is to determine the point on the human body that, according to projection, is “responsible” for a particular organ. At any point (and there are about 660 of them known), the specialist inserts a special needle up to twelve cm long and 0.3 to 0.45 mm thick. With this thickness, the acupuncture needle is not straight, but has a helical structure, perceptible only to the touch. The tip, which remains “sticking out,” ends with a kind of knob, so that such a needle reminds the pack of a pin, and not a needle.

So smoothly we moved on to another sewing item - a pin. Over the centuries, humanity has invented quite a lot of pins. They are all different and have different purposes and histories. First, we'll talk about sewing pins, which look like a needle with a ball or eyelet head. In the form in which they are familiar to us, they have been known since the 15th century. Nowadays, tailor's pins have not only a metal ball, but also a bright plastic ball. These pins are especially convenient for sewing. There are also so-called “carnations” - pins for packing men’s shirts. They are similar to ordinary ones, only shorter and their metal ball is very small.

In principle, the history of a needle and a sewing pin are very similar in their stages, because Tailors always felt the need for pins when they needed to pin together pieces of clothing for fitting or sewing, which means they needed both needles and pins at the same time. The history of the pin used for sewing is, of course, shorter than the history of the needle, because... ancient people did not feel the need for pins due to their simple cut and simple sewing technology. The need appears in the late Gothic period, when clothing became tight-fitting to the body, and therefore required a precise cut. This in turn changed sewing technology: it became difficult to hold numerous cut pieces while sewing them together, and pins were required.

Another thing is curious: neither the guild communities of the Middle Ages for making needles, nor the factories or manufactories in the future, ever paid attention to the requests of tailors. They made pins, but for other purposes: decorative (we will talk about them in the next issue), pins for fastening papers, for fastening clothes (in a sock), etc. For some reason, they were not interested in tailor's pins, and the tailors were forced to use them according to the “residual” principle: they were content with whatever fell apart.

The situation improved gradually. In the middle of the 18th century, the French made the first modern type of pins. England, which by that time had become the main supplier of needles, did not lag behind. In 1775, the Continental Congress of the North American Colonies announced the establishment of a prize that would be awarded to the person who could produce the first 300 pins equal in quality to those imported from England. But only in the 19th century, with the development of the fashion industry, the industry began to make sewing pins, as they say, personally for tailors.

As for pins for “paper” purposes, the need for them became acute at the beginning of the Renaissance, when scientists and writers appeared, and they had a lot of papers that required temporary fastening (as opposed to traditional stapling - after all, there were no binders in those days ). Pins were made by stretching metal bars into wire, which was then cut into pieces of the required length. A metal head was attached to the resulting blanks. With the invention of a special drawing board, work went faster, and about 4 thousand pins were produced per hour. The work was stalled due to the fact that the packers could not keep up with the machine - they only managed to pack about one and a half thousand pieces a day. There was an urgent need to come up with something. And they came up with an idea. The principle of division of labor. (This principle was later used as the basis for the conveyor line). The eminent 18th-century economist Adam Smith once calculated that if not for this principle, only a few pins would be produced per day. This calculation of his was later included in textbooks on economics and some other disciplines.

Throughout history, only a few pin making machines have been invented. The most successful one was invented by physicist John Ireland Howe, the namesake of Elias Howe, one of the creators of the sewing machine in America. This was not his first invention; before that, he experimented in a completely different area - with rubber, but failed there. He was inspired to invent the pin machine by hard work in an almshouse, where he made pins by hand. The first machine turned out poorly (not very lucky, apparently, there was an inventor). But with the help of the second, 60 thousand pins were produced per day. Immediately there was a need to invent a machine that would immediately pack pins (in those days they were pinned to cardboard sheets).

It is curious that humanity has always experienced a shortage of pins. Henry VIII even issued a decree prohibiting the sale of pins every day, special days were set aside for this. This did not improve the situation with the deficit, on the contrary - confusion, crush, bustle, queues began (!); The decree had to be canceled after some time.

Analyzing this situation, you come to completely unexpected conclusions: can you imagine what kind of thirst people had for knowledge and learning if pins for fastening papers were such a terrible shortage?!

It’s clear that there simply weren’t enough pins for tailoring needs and no one thought about tailors. Pins were not only scarce, they were of great value and were expensive. A set of pins was such a necessary thing that it served as a wonderful gift for almost any holiday. The reverent attitude towards pins has survived to this day - we carefully collect scattered pins and put them in a safe place.

A little more history

Thimble. In China in the 3rd century BC, the thimble was invented. The very first thimbles were made from thick leather. Later they began to be made from copper and bronze. Wealthy people ordered gold or silver thimbles for themselves. Interesting fact: one of the professional awards in the fashion industry in France is called the Golden Thimble.

And just ideas

Beautiful pincushions and their history

Every home has a large number of sewing needles, although often we are not professional seamstresses. But no one can do without them, and therefore they must be stored correctly so as not to search for the right needle every time. You can make a beautiful pincushion to store needles. It can be simple in appearance or, with some imagination, it can be decorated so that it will be a beautiful interior decoration.

One of the most indispensable things for sewing and needlework is a pincushion. This is a case or cushion for needles and pins used in sewing. In ancient times, when fabric just began to spread, needle beds were made using any fabric and paper that were interchanged. But only rich people could afford them. Later, pincushions were made of wood or ivory, and between them there was velvet material where pins and needles were stored. Later, when people learned to melt metal, the base for pincushions was made of tin, silver, gold, which only wealthy people could also afford; the poor made pincushions from scrap materials.

Pincushion cushions are often created by handicraftsmen for decorative purposes. They can be of a simple shape - a square, a circle, a heart - or complex: in the form of a handbag, an animal figurine, a flower. A simple homemade needle bed can be made from cardboard, printed material, such as cotton wool or foam rubber, or fabric. Pincushions are decorated with embroidery, appliqué, and knitting can be used instead of fabric.

Pincushion "Flower"

Pincushion "Hat"

You will need: a piece of cotton fabric: chintz, calico, linen; padding polyester, thread and needle for sewing, lace, ribbon for decoration

Progress:

Cut out two circles with a diameter of 11 cm and 5 cm from a piece of an unnecessary plastic box (for example, packaging), or from any thick cardboard. In order to carefully circle the circle, you can use an ordinary tea cup

Cut out the pieces from the main fabric.

To do this, attach the cut cardboard circles to the fabric and add hem and seam allowances. You should get two pieces of fabric with diameters of 19 cm and 13 cm.

Filling and shaping the craft.

Gather each of the circles along the edges with a thread and tighten slightly. Pay attention to how the assembly is distributed - thicker at one end and less dense at the other.

Place padding polyester into the smaller piece. And in the larger one, put a circle of plastic or cardboard.

Pull and tighten the threads so that a flat lower part of the needle bed head and an upper volumetric filled part are formed.

Decoration and decoration of the “hat” pincushion

Connect, sew and decorate the seam line (the connection between the top and bottom of the hat) with lace and a ribbon on top in a circle.

Next, make a rosette from the ribbon, twisting the bottom edge of the ribbon and, as it were, tucking in the top. Or you can use a small ready-made decorative rose made from ribbon with green leaves.

Fold a bow from a thin satin ribbon and connect it together with a rose and sew it to the “hat” - a pincushion.

Another pincushion "Hat"

Pincushion "Pumpkin"

Take: fabric, padding polyester, needle and thread, scissors

Work process:

Cut two circles with a diameter of 6 - 9 cm from the fabric. You can first draw a circle on paper or cardboard to make a neater circle.

Place the pieces right sides inward and stitch around the circumference, leaving an opening of about 2 cm.

Turn out and stuff tightly with padding polyester. Sew up the hole.

Using a long needle, starting from the middle, sew and tighten the pad.

It’s better to divide the pillow into 8 segments and you’ll get a small pumpkin like this.

Pincushion "Jar"

And a few more beautiful pincushions

Every person stores pins and needles in pincushions. This simple but useful thing can be found in every home. It is difficult to say exactly when the pincushion appeared, but it is possible to trace the stages of its development.

The needle is the oldest human invention. It was invented even before the wheel. The needle could be found in any home. It was used by both peasants and noble people.

Until the 20th century, everyone did needlework. It was customary to wear embroidery when visiting people. And the needles needed to be stored somewhere.

People called needle beds needle cases. This item was highly revered. Mothers gave pincushions to their daughters. When a girl got married, she took the needle case with her to her husband’s house. The richer the family was, the more expensive the needle case was.

In the 15th century in Europe, needles and pins were stored in special boxes. They were made from silver and ivory. At the same time, needle cases began to be stuffed with wool and covered with fabric.

By the mid-16th century, pincushions had stands. And in the 17th century they were made from very high quality materials - this showed the wealth of the owner.

In the 19th century, pincushions were considered a decorative element. They were made to order.

And now pincushions are completely different! And sewn, and embroidered (biscornu), and in the shape of flowers or animals, and in a jar, and travel, and, of course, antique. My favorite ones are the cute ones like in the photo.