Sudbury in Suffolk is Britain's most important centre for silk weaving. Its three millsproduce almost all of the the country's woven silk textiles, and one can still find some of the three-storey weaver's cottages which predate the C19 mills. The Gainsborough Gallery (above) in the recently restored and extended Gainsborough's House museum and art gallery has silk wall coverings created by Humphries Weaving, a long-established Sudbury company. (Sudbury Silk Mills has a mill shop which is also well worth a visit.)

The KA Almgren silk business (est. 1833) in Stockholm was once a leading producer of silk scarves, shawls, ribbons, and beautiful Jacquard fabrics for clothing and furnishing. Today the 1862 mill on the island of Södermalm houses both a small active weaving business - the only one left in the Nordic region - and a museum with Jacquard and ribbon looms (above) and a fascinating permanent exhibition. 

Lyon's silk weaving history is built into the city itself. Its famous traboules created a complex network of covered, often hidden, passageways which linked courtyards and staircases, provided quick routes to the river, and enabled manufacturers to transport their wares safely and out of the rain. There were at one time as many as four hundred traboules, but now only forty or so are open to the public, a fascinating glimpse of old Lyon. There is also an excellent silk museum. 

This week on the Post the subject is historical silk-weaving locations. Spitalfields in London is, of course, the most famous one in Britain. This is where Huguenot weavers who fled religious persecution in France in the C18 set up their looms and produced stunning silk fabrics, many designed by Anna Maria Garthwaite (1688-1763). They worked in the attics and upper floors of the Georgian townhouses, and today many of the long leaded windows that let in maximum light can still be seen. This photo shows those in the historic C19 London Dispensary at 21 Church Street, now 27 Fournier Street. 

As well as the paintings of young women and girls for which she is best known, Dod Procter also produced many still lifes and flower paintings. This is The Hall Table (exh 1931, Towneley) which suggests a glamorous lifestyle rather at odds with Newlyn and more akin to that of Vera in They Were Sisters. But in fact photos show that Dod (whose name was actually Doris) cultivated a very contemporary, stylish, androgynous look.  

Dod Procter and her artist husband Ernest Procter (1886-1935) were close to, but not at the heart of the group of artists, who moved to Newlyn in early part of the C20. It is easy to locate their house and there are some nice photos of the two of them walking and working in the steep and narrow streets of Newlyn with their easels and canvases. Whilst other artists were drawn to the sea, boats, and fisherman, Dod Procter sought out different subjects, such as the Tolcarne Inn (1935 Penlee House) which is still very much in business.