Women all over the world have covered their heads for centuries, for myriad reasons, and a complete history of the traditional headscarf in all its forms and designs would take more than one encyclopaedic volume.
Moving from the East to the West in merchant’s carriages, changing its appearance and semantic meaning, this brightly coloured piece of cloth became a part of ethnic costume, a sacred sign of female maturity, or a flirtatious detail of fashionable attire, a symbol of love and separation in poetry. It went down onto the shoulders and hid in the breast pocket, turned into an instrument of propaganda and became an element of glamour.
The Great Silk Road
It all started in China. Chinese embroidery migrated from banners and carpets to clothing only in the 7th century, when the ladies of the upper class briefly took a fancy to scarves under the influence of cultural contacts with other countries of the East. However, the fashion for patterned scarves did not take root in the Celestial Empire.
Although the noble Chinese women quickly forgot about their hobby, embroidered silk fabrics became a subject of lively interest in the West. After a long journey along the Great Silk Road, the shawls found their way to Russia and Europe. In the 17th century, the development of maritime trade with China and the subsequent colonization of the Philippines provided embroidered scarves for the inhabitants of Spain — this is how Manila shawls appeared, which inspired Balenciaga.
Just as with porcelain, western countries gradually opened their own factories. Patterns that initially followed Chinese designs changed over time and became associated with the locality where they were woven, embroidered or printed using the block method (wooden blocks and dyes).
Roses and ‘Cucumbers’
This block printing technique came from India. The Persian-influenced pattern of boteh, an almond or pine cone-shaped motif which later became known as paisley (thanks to manufacturers in the Scottish town of Paisley, because British soldiers in the 17th century brought them the first samples of scarves from the colonies), spread all over the world.
How can one not think of the patterned Kashmiri shawls in which Napoleon-era fashionistas in translucent white dresses wrapped themselves! Bonaparte’s successful Egyptian campaign brought a frenzy of new cultures to Europe. French women became trendsetters, but the products of Russian serfs looked quite different — restrained paisley was replaced by a riot of colour.
The traditional dress of most of the ethnic peoples of Russia includes head coverings for women, and the cold climate means one needs to wrap up warm. This element played an important role in the development of production of shawls and scarves made of wool, silk and cotton, woven, embroidered, and printed in various ways. In the 19th century the most famous scarf manufacturers were those of the merchants Labzin and Gryaznov, the Kudin brothers in Pavlovsky Posad, a town about 70 kilometres east of Moscow, the Prokhorov Tryokhgornaya Manufaktura in Moscow, and the Zubkov factory in the Vladimir province. Some of the ancient manufacturers survived to modern times, adapting to changing conditions.
Despite the existence of their own national designs, textile production in Russia relied on western Europe- an patterns. Before the revolution, factory owners would copy foreign patterns. Over time, recognizable palettes and patterns developed. Silk Lasalle fabrics, which were woven according to the drawings of the 18th century French Rococo artist Philippe de Lasalle, were influential. Scenes of rosy-cheeked shepherdesses were not popular outside France, but the motif of the lush rose spread throughout Europe and Russia; for example, even today many know that roses and ‘cucumbers’ on a black background is the pattern of the Pavlovo Posad scarf.
Scarves of the Revolution
In the Krasnaya Niva magazine (1925), one can find a drawing by sculptor and painter Vera Mukhina based on sketches by the famous Russian fashion designer Nadezhda Lamanova, and detailed instructions on how to make a fashionable dress from a headscarf. It would seem that the scarf in its usual interpretation was doomed to fade into the past as a symbol of old Russia, leaving only revolutionary scarlet headscarves as a reminder. But despite the radicalism of early Soviet culture, scarves retained their place in the wardrobe of Soviet women. The ‘Amazons of the avant-garde’, artists Lyubov Popova and Varvara Stepanova, who worked at a textile factory in Ivanovo, had a great influence on Soviet designs.
Students of the avant-garde Moscow Higher Art and Technical Studios, or Vkhutemas, experimented by covering pieces of silk and chintz with agitprop and suprematist designs. Some of their achievements — for example, the introduction of aerography and photographic printing into textile design — were reflected in the products of the Tryokhgornaya and the Red Rose factories.
Over time, folk motifs returned to the patterns of Soviet scarves, and in the 1960s, riding the wave of enthusiasm for traditional crafts, textile artists borrowed patterns from house carvings and tiles. In the 1980s, lush bouquets blossomed on silk scarves from the Novost factory in Leningrad, created by artist Boris Migal, who rehabilitated floral patterns in classic style.
New Style
The paisley pattern was brought back to Western fashion by Etro after its founder travelled to India, but Russian scarves have often inspired designers from other countries. They can be found in Yves Saint Laurent’s 1976 collection, which bears the name ‘Russian’, and the Japanese designer Kenz? Takada has on numerous occasions used Russian-style scarves to dramatic effect.
Today, on the wave of interest in national traditions, designers are once again turning to scarves, including following the legacy of Lamanova in the 1920s. Of course, the upcycling of scarves is not a new phenomenon, and once this technique was the trademark of fashion designer Vyacheslav Zaitsev.
There are also independent brands that promote scarves as accessories in their own right, rather than just a source of inspiration and recycling. Designers from the Russian Gourji brand, for example, make scarves from silk, modal and cashmere with designs based on Asian patterns and drawings by Léon Bakst, designer for the Ballets Russes, and Russian avant-garde artists.
The scarf’s journey from East to West and back is not over yet. Traditional techniques are being revived by young designers. Today, fans of normcore and beige trench coats are throwing Pavlovo Posad scarves over their shoulders just like their grandmothers did.
