Of all the embroidery techniques, hardangersom is most associated with Norwegian needlearts. (The Norwegian word "som" means embroidery, therefore "hardangersom" means Hardanger embroidery.) According to Mrs. Aase Bay Sjovold, former textile curator of the Museum of Applied Art in Oslo, hardanger embroidery has a long history but unfortunately is not well documented. In an interview with her just before her retirement she reminded me that hardangersom is not a particularly old needle art to Norwegians (remembering that old to Norway would be associated with the Viking and earlier eras!) and many of the antique pieces are still in family collections and "being used!"
This needle art came to western Norway about the end of the 17th century possibly via Holland from Italy. The Italians may have adopted it from the East during the Renaissance. It is remarkable how examples of handcraft reached all parts of the world at a time when communication was so primitive! As styles traveled the globe they left many variations along the way. It is thought that perhaps since Italian and imported laces were so costly, Norwegian needlewomen created their own version of "lace" through hardanger embroidery.
In the hardanger region located in the district of Hordaland in western Norway, women at the end of the 18th century were spinning their own flax and weaving it into double-weave linen which they embroidered and made into blouses, aprons, bed linens and other household items. Since homes were usually too full of soot and hard to keep clean until the middle of the 19th century, hardangersom was used fairly exclusively for traditional bunads (festive costumes), liturgical pieces and articles for special occasions. Hardanger embroidery is most associated with the hardanger bunad. The word "bunad" actually means "clothes", but in everyday Norwegian language a bunad is a festive costume belonging to a specific region or area. It is worn in celebration of weddings, confirmations, christenings, national holidays, public ceremonies and folk dancing.
The hardanger bunad has become so well loved in Norway, that it has been adopted as the national costume. This bunad consists of a red, woolen, sleeveless bodice embellished with multi-colored cross stitch or beading worn over a white, long-sleeved blouse with high collar, a full-length black woolen skirt and a mid-calf apron made of one width of white linen or cotton fabric. Hardangersom bands are embroidered around the cuffs and collar of the blouse and also horizontally across the bottom of the apron. The bands of embroidery on the apron can be as much as 12" wide. All bunads are made according to precise qualifications, i.e., the skirt must be a certain number of hand-widths from the ankle.
Traditionally, hardangersom is worked with white linen or cotton thread on a matching ground of even weave linen or cotton fabric 22 to 50 threads per inch.
Editor's Thought: On one of my study/research trips to Norway I had the good fortune of "happening" on a magnificent exhibit of Norwegian Samplers at the Museum of Applied Art in Oslo. Several of the antique samplers were stitched on red linen! I had never before seen red linen used for a sampler and was enthralled by them. After leaving the exhibit I went to one of my favorite shops in Norway, the Husfliden. They carry supplies of all kinds for Norwegian arts - and have a wonderful selection of linens, threads, patterns, etc. There on the linen shelf was a bolt of red linen about 32 threads per inch! I took the bolt to a "fairly elderly" saleswoman and asked her to cut half a meter (I could not afford a whole meter!) I pictured a beautiful hardangersom tablerunner stitched with white thread. As the woman was cutting the fabric I said, "I could stitch hardangersom on this, couldn't I?" She stopped cutting, slowly looked up at me - looked me over from head to toe (literally) and went back to cutting! I thought that maybe she had not heard me so I again said, "I could stitch hardangersom on this, right?" She again looked me over and went back to cutting. Suddenly I realized my error and said, "Oh, I realize that it should be white on white, but I could stitch it on this, couldn't I?" She slowly raised her head to look at me and with a strained voice said, "Well, ya." - and went back to cutting! (In recent years hardangersom has been stitched on a beautiful array of colored fabrics both here and abroad - but traditionally it is still white on white or ecru on ecru.)
Early in its history, hardangersom was stitched mainly on linen using linen thread due to the fact that linen was so readily available and inexpensive. Cotton was used only after it became more attainable by cost and import.
This is a very precise technique, the foundation of which is blocks of parallel satin stitches called klosters (kloster means "block" in Norwegian) which are comprised of five stitches over four threads of the fabric. When connected, the klosters are stitched in right angle turns with two corner stitches connected.
Klosters are like "little hands" which hold the threads of the fabric. Just as a hand has five fingers with four spaces between, klosters have five stitches with four threads between and act like little hands in that they hold the threads of the fabric that are not being cut. The threads on the "knuckle" side of the kloster will be cut and withdrawn completely from the fabric leaving the remaining threads to be needle woven.
Hardangersom contains needle weaving techniques such as woven, double-woven and wrapped bars filled with dove's eyes, picots, added spokes, added woven spokes and occasionally a woven wheel. True hardangersom does not contain "elaborate" filling stitches. The beauty of this needle art is in its simplicity. Pulled thread techniques such as cable stitch, ribbon stitch (a form of cable stitch which is comprised of three diagonal rows of stitches worked in much the same theory as the cable stitch), eyelets and the four-sided stitch are frequently used. Most antique pieces were hemmed with either the hemstitching technique, plain hemming or fringed. Very few pieces were finished with a buttonhole edging.That technique would use up far too much thread which was so precious and would be considered a waste of thread for simply hemming a finished piece!
Hardangersom was introduced into the United States around 1840 with the immigration of the Scandinavian peoples. In her book Anna, Norse roots in homestead soil* Anna Guttormsen Hought tells the story of her remarkable journey from Oslo to the American West. Throughout the book she frequently tells of her housekeeping and "making things nice with my hardangersom." Slowly patterns, books and articles detailing the technique appeared in the United States during the early part of the 20th century.
"....I bought the sukker og flote (sugar & creamer) doily and embroidered it for my mother as a surprise. To make the scalloped edge, I used a thimble for a pattern. I drew the tiny scallops all around, then finished them with a satin stitch and cut them out. I was six or seven at the time. I was about fifteen when I made a Hardanger-embroidered tablecloth for my mother, again as a surprise. This time I had to count threads in the material, cut out and weave in the open spaces. Years later, when I first came to America, my mother sent me a large piece of Hardanger to work. "See how much you can do before you come to Norway again," she wrote. Well, I knew what she was thinking - she didn't want me running around. I finished that one and I'm not sure how many more, and when I was in my nineties I found myself teaching classes in the craft."
Anna, Norse roots in homestead soil by Anna Guttormsen Hought, Welcome Press, 1986
Design and history are tied with an unbreakable chain. Hardangersom, as well as all Norwegian needle arts, signifies a simple beauty of a refined people firmly planted in their belief of tradition and country. The unique folk art of Norway was born out of a culture created in a land which was geographically remote and isolated, and yet it grew through influences of other countries' arts and designs. The combination of these elements produced an art form which was become well-known, loved and recognizable as Norwegian Art. The eminent Norwegian cultural anthropologist Professor Moltke Moe wrote in one of his works:
"Cultural development, like modern science, is, to a greater extent than was formerly believed, the product of inter-racial co-operation. It is mainly in the adaptation and reforming of the outside influences that the spirit of the nation reveals itself."
Most definitely the spirit of Norway can be found in its handcrafts.
