This extra large coral reef tapestry puts a whole reef on a wall at 9.2 ft. Shoals of fish run down a shaft of light through deep water, and around them the sea floor fills with fan corals, sea grass, anemones, shrimp and gardens of coral, hundreds of creatures in all, each worked individually by the weaver rather than repeated from a pattern.
Details
- Size: 110 x 69 in (280 x 175 cm)
- Material: handwoven wool
- Signature: signed by the weaver in Arabic, woven into the cloth
- Finish: warp fringe and slit-weave joins, the marks of genuine hand weaving
- One of a kind: woven freehand with no sketch or cartoon behind the warp, so no second copy exists; the photographs show this exact piece.
Hanging it
At this size it becomes the room's main event: a stairwell, a double-height wall, a long dining-room wall or a hotel lobby. It comes without a sleeve or rod pocket. For a piece this large, hook-and-loop tape sewn along the full top edge and a matching strip on a long wooden batten spread the load evenly; a clip rail or a tailor-sewn rod casing also work.
Hundreds of creatures
Slit-weave joins, the small gaps where two colours meet on the loom, show that this large underwater tapestry was built by hand, area by area. The weaver's Arabic signature is woven into the cloth.
Browse more: Egyptian woven tapestries · Fish and Coral Reef · Underwater Fish and Coral
