~TASSEL TALK~

The word 'tassel' comes from the Latin "tassau" which meant a clasp (as for the neck of a garment). This word was also later served to denote string ties, which ended in increasingly elaborate tassels. Today, tassels, or liripipes, are found on mortarboards during graduation ceremonies and possibly upon the shoes of the men at graduation. The tassel is a universal ornament is seen in varying versions in every culture around the globe.

These are some of my tassels and the way I use them. You can click on the photos to enlarge them.



















A tassel is a binding of plaited or otherwise gathered threads from which at one end protrudes a cord on which the tassel is hung, and which may have loose, dangling threads at the other end. Tassels are normally decorative elements, and as such one often finds them attached, usually along the bottom hem, to garments, curtains, or other hangings.










~PASSEMENTERIE~
In this craft a tassel is primarily an ornament, and was, of course, at first the casual termination of a cord to prevent unraveling as its ends which were tied in knots with the remainder of the cord hanging as shreds of it. As time went on, various peoples developed greater or lesser variations of this, until by the time of 16th century France, there was constituted the first Guild of Passementiers who formulated and documented the art of passementerie (pronounced: pahs/mahn/TREE). This art form had the tassel as its primary expression, but also included fringes (applied, as opposed to integral), ornamental cords, galloons, pompons, rosettes, and gimps as other forms. Tassels, pompons, and rosettes are point ornaments; the others are linear ornaments.


~COMPONENTS OF A TASSEL FROM TOP TO BOTTOM~

Its suspending cord
Its body, which is usually made up of one or more moulds
A skirt of fringe or other ornaments.


~MAKING A TASSEL WITH YARN~

(Information taken from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia)

Is there anyone here who makes tassels?