The Golden Thread, Kassia St. Clair
The Golden Thread, Kassia St. Clair
1 Rating(s)
List: $24.99 | Sale: $17.50
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The Golden Thread
How Fabric Changed History

Author: Kassia St. Clair

Narrator: Helen Johns

Unabridged: 11 hr 26 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 11/26/2019

Categories: Nonfiction, Art


Synopsis

The bestselling author of The Secret Lives of Color returns with this rollicking narrative of the 30,000-year history of fabric, briskly told through thirteen charismatic episodes.

From colorful 30,000-year-old threads found on the floor of a Georgian cave to the Indian calicoes that sparked the Industrial Revolution, The Golden Thread weaves an illuminating story of human ingenuity. Design journalist Kassia St. Clair guides us through the technological advancements and cultural customs that would redefine human civilization—from the fabric that allowed mankind to achieve extraordinary things (traverse the oceans and shatter athletic records) and survive in unlikely places (outer space and the South Pole). She peoples her story with a motley cast of characters, including Xiling, the ancient Chinese empress credited with inventing silk, to Richard the Lionhearted and Bing Crosby. Offering insights into the economic and social dimensions of clothmaking—and countering the enduring, often demeaning, association of textiles as "merely women's work"—The Golden Thread offers an alternative guide to our past, present, and future.

About Kassia St. Clair

Kassia St. Clair specializes in telling gripping stories about the overlooked and the everyday. She has written about history and culture for publications including the Economist, Elle, and Times Literary Supplement. The author of The Golden Thread and The Secret Lives of Color, she lives in London.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Gill on February 07, 2019

A real disappointment - for a dilettante, perhaps, rather than an enthusiast. A chronological approach meant some topics were just not dealt with and others - the rise of knitted fabrics, for example - barely touched on. I am not an expert, though I am interested in textiles, but I felt I knew too m......more

Goodreads review by Richard on May 13, 2019

As I write these words, I’m wearing sweatpants and an old faded shirt. I suspect that most readers are also wearing clothes. Oddly, humans are the only animals that make and wear clothing. Our ancestors evolved in the tropics of Mother Africa, where it was so warm that many folks preferred the comfo......more

Goodreads review by AnnaG on November 02, 2018

I think a more accurate description would be "How History Changed Fabric". The chapters go through each fabric from Linen to Synthetics in a broadly chronological narrative highlighting when and why the fabric underwent the biggest changes in production or usage (eg first imports along the Silk Road......more