Before.....
What a gem this is!!!! A fabulous early example of a beaded coin purse circa 1820-1830. This was one of my most challenging repairs, as I spent many hours on its restoration. The purse has two different scenes, as one side has the man or "Cavalier" and the other side depicts what is most likely his loving wife who made the purse for him. Each side has initials for the person depicted. There is extensive damage to the side with the lady. Much of her face and hair are gone along with large sections of the background. Much of the unique side fringe is also missing.
After......
This purse was extremely fragile. It's construction is beaded on canvas, and though the canvas was strong and undamaged, the silk used to attach the beads was deteriorated in several places. This is what created the bead loss. To add to the challenge was the fact that I did not have an identical opposite side to refer to, nor did I have access to a photo of the identical purse. So I had to do research of similar early purses in order to reconstruct her face and hair.
The construction of early purses is much different than those of the later half of the 19th century. You will not find fancy linings with purse trim and pockets, nor will you find those fabulous fringes with multiple color changes. The early purses had the most simple of fringes, often times in only one color and almost always short.
The linings were simple and almost crude in comparison to the intricate beadwork on the exterior. You can see that the lining is stitched to another interior linen layer...so there are actually three layers to this purse. In order to access the canvas and do the repairs, I had to take the entire purse apart, layer by layer. It has been reconstructed exactly as it was. I had to put in a replacement silk lining and decided to sew it in much in the same manner as it was originally.
