Semco novelty designs - table cloths.

Semco produced a large range of linens in the category of 'novelty designs'. Some of them used images from countries around the world such as these cloths with a Mexican flavour. Semco's kits included machine-made crocheted edge for the cloths, but some people chose to hand crochet their cloths, with remarkable differences in the style of crochet, as you can see on these two cloths. If readers of this blog can identify any of these patterns as not being Semco designs, I would greatly appreciate your comments at the end of these posts!





Dutch theme.


Ponies and horses were a popular novelty design.



American Indians.

Sailing ships.

Table cloths..

This supper cloth is a Semco design. It was stitched by a lady in NSW who had three daughters, and kept them supplied in hand embroidered linens all her life. They ended up with so much, one daughter sold some of hers on eBay which is where I found this. She told me her mother was about 83 when she worked this cloth, and could still sew beautifully.

I bought this on eBay from a lady in Western Australia. Stunning embroidered Australian wildflowers.

A souvenir of Queen Elizabeth's first visit to Australia in 1954.

Another souvenir cloth to celebrate the Queen's coronation.

Budgerigars.

More budgerigars. Ever the purist, my husband commented that the colours are all wrong. My response is that like any artist, embroiderers create their own impressions of a subject.

Birds and animals were a very popular theme on linens in the early to mid 20th century. This cloth is unusual in that it combines cross stitched parrots with the foliage worked in other embroidery stitches.

Blue Wrens, Semco design.

Koalas, Semco design.