Description:Cross stitich sampler worked on natural canvas fabric from the Staffordshire County Museum Collection.
The samplers were worked by Mary Anne Price, at Great Haywood School between 1882 and 1884.
Plain school sewing samplers began to emerge in the 19th and early 20th centuries. They were commonly made up of several pieces of plain sewing flannel of linen. Sometimes even miniature garments were made. Plain sewing samplers began in charity schools and orphanages, this developed and later became to be part of the school curricula in domestic science and needlework. It was also a requirement of the City and Guilds examinations.
Knowledge of stitches and processes such as gathering, tacking and inserting gussets was essential even though after the 1860s some homes had a domestic sewing machine.