"Prophetic pins": sentiment and sensation in layette pincushions, 1760-1840
Date
2025
Authors
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Publisher
University of Delaware
Abstract
In the late-eighteenth and early-nineteenth centuries, layette pincushions were a common gift for expectant mothers either during pregnancy or just after the birth of the child. Created by a family member, friend, or neighbor, they would often be included as part of a layette set which is a collection of clothing and other items needed for the care of a newborn baby. Pins were heavily used by women in the eighteenth century for pinning babies’ diapers, headgear, clothing, and swaddling. These objects were typically marked with the initials and birth date of the child and included phrases such as “Welcome Little Stranger” and “God Bless the Babe and May It Live.” These words took on anticipatory and contingent significance as they would often be created before the birth of the child and would entirely shift in meaning if either the mother or the child did not survive the birth, which was a common occurrence during this era. As the messages and motifs are formed using the exposed pin heads as a design element, the aesthetic and sentimental value must be sacrificed by removing the pins to use them as fasteners. ☐ The practice of materially marking initials and dates on domestic textile objects is rooted in the needlework practices that women would have learned at an early age, beginning with embroidery samplers. Layette pincushions exemplify the material skills and moral values that early needlework education instilled in women as well as directly representing the significance of their assigned roles as mothers. Throughout women’s history the needle has been portrayed as both an instrument of suffering and reclamation as it represents the history of women’s oppression but also their ability to transcend these prescribed roles and gain a greater degree of autonomy. Directly related to the needle, the pin also contains a multitude of dualistic qualities. Opposed to the notions of care intended by these objects, layette pincushions also retain an inherent quality of violence. In addition to their ability to join or mend, pins can also cause pain, which was unfortunately a common occurrence for babies getting stuck with their own diaper pins prior to the invention of safety pins in 1849. ☐ Due to their unique materiality and distinct function, layette pincushions are valuable historical repositories of eighteenth-century craft, culture, and maternal identity. Women in the eighteenth century continuously crafted textile objects by hand that are imbued with sentimental value and continue to serve as mnemonic devices to fill the absence of loss. Existing at the intersection of material culture, the history of emotions, sensory history, and women’s history, this thesis seeks to draw out the relationships between the sensory experience and sentimental emotion of materially marking familial relationships with the shifting temporalities of anticipatory, commemorative, and memorial objects.
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Keywords
Eighteenth century, Material culture, Needlework, Pincushions, Textile history, Women's history