A detail from a woman’s jacket from Bethlehem showing the use of cord couching with embroidery to create stylised floral motifs with floss silk details (early 20th century).
© The Trustees of the British Museum, acc. no. As1966,01.6.
Cord couching is a technique whereby a cord is sewn down to a ground material using a second thread. Cord couching is a form of passementerie, whereby the main design is created using a cord or a braid. The patterns produced in cord couching are usually stylised floral motifs with space in between the cords, so that the ground material can be seen.
In cord couching, often coloured embroidery threads are used to highlight details. This type of couching is associated, for example, with parts of the Mediterranean and can be found in nineteenth and early twentieth century Greek, Palestinian (notably Bethlehem couching) and Turkish decorative needlework.
British Museum online catalogue (retrieved 18th June 2016).
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