bargello

/bahr jel"oh/, n.

1. a straight stitch worked in a high and low relief pattern to form a variety of zigzag or oblique designs.

2. needlepoint work or a design done in such stitches, esp. the traditional needlepoint created by a classic stitch (Florentine stitch) done in diagonal lines.

[1920-25; allegedly after a set of chairs embroidered with such a stitch in the Bargello, a museum in Florence]

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or Florentine canvas work

Type of 17th-century embroidery, named for the upholstery of a set of Italian chairs at Florence's Bargello Museum.

It consists of a wavy zigzag pattern of flat vertical stitches laid parallel with the canvas weave, rather than crossing the intersections diagonally as in most canvas stitches, in gradating tones of the same colour or in contrasting colours. The characteristic stitch is called Florentine, cushion, Hungarian, or flame stitch (an allusion to the flamelike gradation of colour).

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