Gu Embroidery

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Gu Embroidery, or Gu Xiu, was created, developed, and passed down by the female members of the Gu Ming-shi family, a prominent household in the Songjiang Prefecture during the Ming Dynasty. It is the only embroidery style in China named after a family and has experienced over 400 years of evolution, preservation, and transformation.

The embroidery is also known as Gu Family Embroidery, Lu Xiang Yuan Gu Embroidery, or Gu Embroidery of Lu Xiang Yuan, as Gu Mingshi once built a private garden named "Lu Xiang Yuan" in the county town of Shanghai (in today's Jiumudi Luxiangyuan Road area). The name "Luxiangyuan Road" survives as a tribute to this historic garden.

Gu Embroidery gained the attention and support of many literati and scholars of the Songjiang region, most notably Dong Qichang—a leading figure of the late-Ming Songjiang painting school. He championed the concept of "painted embroidery" and personally guided its development. In the last five years of his life, Dong Qichang wrote inscriptions for Gu Embroidery on three occasions, praising it as "exquisitely crafted beyond compare—no peer could match its brilliance... At a glance, it seems like a painting or calligraphy, but under closer expert inspection, one realizes it is the work of needle and thread. Human skill here reaches the heights of divine craftsmanship—astonishing indeed!" His evaluation granted authoritative recognition to the art form.

The Songjiang Gazetteer from the Chongzhen era records: "Gu Embroidery, in square compositions, features finely detailed birds and flowers; sachets depict human figures with exquisite craftsmanship unmatched in other regions." Among surviving works, those by Han Ximeng—the granddaughter-in-law of Gu Mingshi—are particularly esteemed. Her pieces are rich in cultural and artistic value and are now treasured by major museums as national relics.

By the end of the Ming Dynasty, the decline of the Gu family marked a turning point for Gu Embroidery. It began to spread beyond aristocratic circles and into the homes of common people. Women across Songjiang began learning the craft, and "Gu Embroidery" gradually became synonymous with Jiangnan embroidery at large, influencing regions such as Suzhou, Nanjing, Hangzhou, Hunan, and Sichuan. Gu Mingshi came to be honored in Jiangnan as the "Ancestor of Embroidery."

The brilliance of Gu Embroidery lies in its ability to "paint with needle and thread." Using thread as ink, and masterpieces of painting as templates, it transforms silk thread into vivid landscapes, human figures, flowers, and birds. The resulting works are lifelike, delicate, and filled with spirit and rhythm. Celebrated as "painted embroidery", Gu Embroidery is known for its refined techniques, elegant style, and high artistic merit. It had a significant influence on the development of the four major embroidery traditions of the Qing Dynasty.

What makes Gu Embroidery truly extraordinary is the combination of several factors: the embroiderers' deep cultural and artistic literacy, the refined and elegant subject matter, careful selection of materials, flexible and innovative stitching techniques, and a disciplined, persevering attitude. These qualities have elevated Gu Embroidery to a realm where painting and embroidery blend into one seamless art form.

Original Chinese text source:
https://www.ichshanghai.cn/