The Cleveland Museum of Art

Collection Online as of December 18, 2025

Yellow silk hanging embroidered with a skinny tree, dark brown trunk only slightly wider than the winding branches sprouting pink and blue flowers and long, green leaves. These cover the entirety of the fabric save for the rectangular border, where the repeated pink flowers are interspersed with smaller pink and blue ones and brown and green vines with blue and pink bows. The bows imitate the larger one tied around the trunk of the tree, with double blue ears and a pink knot in the middle, speckled with white dots like the tree trunk.

Silk hanging with embroidered tree of life

1800s

Turkey, Ottoman period

Silk: plain weave; embroidery, chain stitch
Average: 228.6 x 172.7 cm (90 x 68 in.)
Gift of Mr. and Mrs. J. H. Wade 1916.1358
Location: Not on view

Description

This resplendent tree of life embroidery integrates Turkish traditions with new European styles that became increasingly fashionable during the mid-18th century. The fanciful tree projects lavish bouquets of Turkish flowers while the tree trunk is wrapped with an elaborate European-style bow, as are the meandering vines in the floral border.

A professional draftsman drew the pattern with ink on the radiant yellow silk taffeta embroidered with at least 12 vibrant colors in chain stitch. It was most likely made in a professional workshop as a hanging for special occasions, a conspicuous symbol of beauty and wealth.
  • Mackie, Louise. "Luxuriance." Cleveland Art: Cleveland Museum of Art Members Magazine 53, no. 4 (July/August 2013): 12-14. Reproduced: p. 12 archive.org
    Mackie, Louise W. Symbols of Power: Luxury Textiles from Islamic Lands, 7th-21st Century. Cleveland; New Haven: Cleveland Museum of Art; Yale University Press, 2015. Mentioned and reproduced: P. 336-337, fig. 8.54
    Highet, Juliet. "Silks from Islamic Lands." The Asian Art Newspaper: Monthly for Collectors, Dealers, Museums and Galleries 17, issue 5 (March 2014):16-18. 18
  • Luxuriance: Silks from Islamic Lands, 1250–1900. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (May 14, 2013-June 23, 2014).
  • {{cite web|title=Silk hanging with embroidered tree of life|url=false|author=|year=1800s|access-date=18 December 2025|publisher=Cleveland Museum of Art}}

Source URL:

https://www.clevelandart.org/art/1916.1358