Our new intimate exhibition, Tales of Textiles: The RSN Collection in Focus,  highlights the life of key objects from the Royal School of Needlework’s Collection & Archive with a focus on English embroidery.

The exhibition opens on 25 September and in our first talk of the season, RSN Curator, Dr Isabella Rosner gives us a sneak preview of some of the objects on display and explains why she chose them. Selected from our first 100 objects to be digitised, these pieces span three centuries and tell a story of wear and use, protection and care, tradition and innovation, and stitchers domestic and professional.

“Through these pieces we see not only connections between who embroiders and who uses embroidery, but also the ever present hand of the maker and the user, their humanity evident in every stitch,” says Isabella.