EMBROIDERY

Clothing decoration, in ancient times done using red and white threads (which connect the cosmic worlds of the living and the dead through the heavenly, earthly, and infernal, but also the psychological levels of consciousness - superconscious, conscious and subconscious). In the old days they were of the colours of the Sun, Moon, blood and fire, i.e. life.

Threading the needle represents the passage through heaven's door. Weaving and embroidery are basically women's work (although during winter in Medjimurje men also weaved) and are identified with men's work like ploughing, a creative act through which the signs of fertility and cultivated land are shaped. A person wearing embroidered clothes was protected by god. Clothes are embroidered using numbers (by counting the needle-points) or using letters (by creating a picture). Following the path from darkness into the light was in this way was passed on to women by fairies, after the work in the fields was done in late autumn or winter, never on Saturdays or during the night so the embroidery does not fall apart and the eyes turn blind. Collars, shirts, head-dress, and the edges of clothes are embroidered most often. Very common is also the connecting seam which is white and perforated (similar to decorative knitting) and which is used to sew two pieces of cloth together. Golden embroidery, mostly used in Slavonia to decorate the national costume originates from the eastern Turkish influence. Silver embroidery, sewn using silver string called ''srma'' is mosly used in the Dinaric part of Croatia. Except embroidery, applications (small pieces of cloth sewn onto the garment), ribbons (used to decorate cloth or leather) were used.