Textiles in the home are important indicators of wealth, status, aspiration, taste and availability of resources. Documents such as inventories preserve important information on the type, quantities and use of textiles, and local ones reveal substantial numbers of Norwich textiles in the homes from humble to wealthy between the 15th and 17th centuries. Not all the textiles will have been made locally, but the majority undoubtedly were Norwich textiles, especially saye for hangings, dornix for beds and turkeywork for upholstery are widely mentioned across East Anglia and the rest of England.

Such records reveal changing fashions of interior decoration, especially for high status pieces like beds. Most inventories listed the bed furnishings in detail from ropes and mats to twilts, coverlets, valances and testers. They also chart the demise of tapestries, and stained or painted cloths from the 16th century, and the rise of upholstered furniture and use of decorative needlework in the 17th and the tendency to invest in matching sets of window and bed- curtains in the 18th.

A particularly interesting local example is the 1589 inventory of Alderman Robert Suckling, Norwich merchant, which records quantities of Turkeywork furnishing, table carpets, Dornix, saye and embroidered cushions and high status bed set of sarsanett. 17th century inventories tend to be less detailed but show increasing variety in types of furniture and household equipment.

As inventory evidence becomes less informative so more images and individual pieces begin to survive to provide information on the use of Norwich textiles in the home. Norwich-made damask wall coverings and many types of curtains in fine fabrics were in use in British wealthy country homes. New England fashions of the mid 18th century were fore worsted fabrics like camlets, callimanco, china or cheyney and harrateen, often using watered, waived or figured designs. Sets of curtains were extremely costly.

Tastes and technology underwent a revolution in the 19th century, and the Norwich-made furnishing fabrics that survive are very different. A range of bright silks and mixtures was on offer from Francis Hindes, featuring both formal geometric and stylised pine motifs. Horsehairs were widely used for seating and linings, and the good examples are held in the Hovell and Orph pattern book.

We would like to hear from anyone who has information or images of possible Norwich furnishing fabrics.