Bookmark

Description

This commemorative silk bookmark features a Jacquard woven image of the Machinery Hall pavilion at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition. It was made by the Phoenix Silk Manufacturing Company. The company had mills in Pennsylvania and New Jersey, but this commemorative bookmark was woven on site at the Exposition, which was held in Chicago, Illinois. The bookmark was made using a loom with a Jacquard attachment, a machine able to weave complex designs by following instructions fed into the device on a series of punch cards. As a showcase of modern weaving technology, visitors to the Exposition could watch these souvenirs being woven on the mechanical looms before purchasing them. This object is one of a large group transferred to Winterthur from the American Textile History Museum when it closed in 2017.