passementerie (POSS΄-mahn-tree)

    I remember Sunday nights at my grandmother’s house, when my parents had to warn at least one of us children not to play with the the tassels and fringe on the living room curtains.

     Those decorative elements—along with braiding and other types of trim used on bed canopies, upholstered furniture, and throw pillows—are collectively called passementerie.

     Not as popular today as it was in centuries past, passementerie can still add the final touch of elegance to formal and period rooms.

     High quality passementerie is expensive, since much of it must be done by hand, which is why my parents warned us to stay away from it.

     “Spina specializes in high-end, handmade passementerie....  Needless to say, all this froufrou does not come cheap. The satin-ribbon curtain tieback has strands of Swarovski crystal beads and costs about $550. The smaller, 2- to 3-inch tassels, of suede and the feathers of a guinea fowl, are about $40 each.” (New York Times, March 13, 2003)

Passementerie styles from A Handbook of Ornament,
a late 19th-century pattern book.