Of all of the ways in which King Charles III’s coronation broke with tradition, perhaps the most notable—at least for the Vogue editors frantically covering it in real time—was the newly anointed monarch’s decision to credit the designers and craftspeople involved in bringing the spectacle to life. In lieu of the usual email-based detective work required to figure out what, exactly, the Princess of Wales was wearing at Westminster Abbey, Buckingham Palace released nine pages of credits for the outfits alone—name-checking Alexander McQueen’s Sarah Burton alongside John Meyer, the 19th-century tailor who lined the Imperial Mantle with its gold bullion fringe for George IV back in 1821.
For those intrigued by the latter, this month, the work of Meyer’s cohorts goes on display at the Guildhall Art Gallery as part of Treasures of Gold and Silver Wire, an exhibition opening to coincide with the 400th anniversary of The Worshipful Company of Gold and Silver Wyre Drawers. Said Worshipful Company is one of The Livery Companies of London, i.e. trade guilds whose history can be traced back to the Middle Ages. The name derives from the Livery robes that their members must wear on formal occasions, many of which are emblazoned with a coat of arms (a quartet of aces for the Makers of Playing Cards, a golden sheep for the Drapers, et cetera). More than 100 such guilds still exist today, including chandlers and girdlers, fletchers and skinners, sadlers and blacksmiths, all operating within the confines of the City of London—a modern financial district, yes, but also the ancient heart of the British capital, ringed by Roman walls.
Even more fascinating than the Gold and Silver Wyre Drawers’s continued existence is the painstakingly intricate nature of the work the company promotes and protects. In its most traditional form, it entails taking bars of the purest silver burnished with gold leaf and passing them through increasingly tiny holes in a drawplate. (Because medieval guildsmen weren’t above a pun, the company’s official motto is amicitiam trahit amor, or love draws forth friendship.) By the end, the thinnest wires will have a diameter of less than two-thousandths of an inch, finer than human hair, before being turned into purl or thread and embroidered onto all manner of regalia—much of which forms the basis of Treasures.
Dr Karen Watts, curator emeritus at the Royal Armouries, began her research for the 200-object exhibition five years ago, “writing to churches, writing to palaces, writing to private collectors,” in preparation for the quatercentenary. It’s James I who issued the Gold and Silver Wyre Drawers with their first royal patent in 1623, although the guild’s origins can be traced back to at least the 15th century; its members were responsible for the sea of gold-wire pavilions at Henry VIII’s historic 1520 tournament, The Field of the Cloth of Gold, outside of Calais.
“The history is astonishing,” Watts tells me in her office in the Guildhall, a mannequin draped in a Yeoman of the Guard uniform looming behind her, “but what’s most fascinating to me is the fact that this art form is still being practiced in 21st-century Britain. Take Ede Ravenscroft or Hand Locke, which were founded in the 1600s and 1700s respectively, and are still putting the same craft to use making Robes of State for Court Trumpeters and the like. And then there are the students from the Glasgow School of Art and the Royal School of Needlework featured in the exhibition, who are using gold and silver thread to make the most extraordinary contemporary work.”
In terms of major historical acquisitions, Watts quickly set her sights on securing the 16th-century Bacton Altar Cloth for display, a reworking of a gown that once belonged to Queen Elizabeth I. Using a combination of Indian indigo, Latin American cochineal and gold and silvery embroidery, its cream silk is meticulously adorned with anatomically precise flora and fauna, from raspberries to caterpillars. Today, the original dress is believed to be immortalized in the Rainbow Portrait—so named for its inscription, non sine sole iris, or no rainbow without the sun—with historians positing that it was repurposed after the Queen’s “Chief Gentlewoman” Blanche Parry donated it to St Faith’s Church in Herefordshire following Elizabeth’s death.
It’s an intact dress that Watts is more excited about, though: namely, Queen Mary’s Coronation gown, worn for her crowning alongside King George V in 1911. Designed by Reville and Rossiter, a London couturier that shuttered in the ’30s, and borrowed from the Royal Collection, it was actually stitched “by the Princess Louise School of Needlework” founded by Queen Victoria’s daughter. “It started out on Sloane Street with just 20 women employees, and would go on to become the Royal School of Needlework.”
Queen Mary’s granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth II, is well represented within Treasures, too. There’s her coronation glove—loaned for the exhibition by The Worshipful Company of Glovers—and embellished with a design of roses, shamrocks, thistles, and acorns worked in gold thread. Then there are the Jubilee vestments, embroidered with the spires of 73 churches within the Diocese of London, worn to commemorate Her Majesty’s Silver Jubilee at St Paul’s Cathedral in 1977. Fans of The Crown, meanwhile, will recognize the recreation of Norman Hartnell’s coronation gown for Elizabeth II, worn by Claire Foy in the drama’s blockbuster first season. Harrods actually commissioned the replica to display in its windows during the Queen’s Diamond Jubilee Celebrations, before giving it to Angels Costumes for use in the Netflix drama.
And then there are objects with less obvious royal ties: the blue-and-gold robes worn by David Tennant as Richard II, on loan from the Royal Shakespeare Company; a court suit made for Charles Dickens to attend the Prince of Wales’s levée at St James’s Palace in 1870; the carnation-pink costume in which the Royal Ballet’s Darcey Bussell performed Sylvia, its bodice and tulle skirt lined with a Greek key pattern; and myriad objects from the other Worshipful Companies themselves, including spectacular hearse cloths. “The Fishmongers have one that’s embroidered with sea creatures, including a mermaid gazing at her own reflection in a tiny silver mirror, which is just exquisite. It’s hard to actually conceive of the talent involved in making some of these pieces. In the end, this exhibition is about celebrating the work of human hands, in the Middle Ages, in the 21st century, and all the years in between. Long may it continue.”
Treasures of Gold and Silver Wire is at the Guildhall Art Gallery in the City of London from 29 September to 12 November