Pillow tubing

Description

Continental Mills, located in Lewiston, Maine, manufactured this cotton pillow tubing in the early to mid-20th century. This section of yardage includes the bolt end with two labels still attached. Textile manufacturers used labels like these to identify their products, as well as proclaim their quality, to both retailers and consumers. The larger label includes an engraving of a woman operating a spinning wheel in a domestic setting, perhaps to suggest that this cloth, which was in fact produced in a textile mill, had a homemade touch. Text on the smaller label speaks directly to consumers, informing them that this pillow tubing “Requires hemming only, doing away with the overhand seam. With it, pillow slips are easily made and laundered.” This object is one of a large group transferred to Winterthur from the American Textile History Museum when it closed in 2017.