Anna Maria Garthwaite (attrib.)
Panel of aquamarine blue silk satin damask, the design attributed to Spitalfields designer Anna Maria Garthwaite (1688–1763). With a large-scale, luxuriant floral and foliate pattern.
An identical length of silk, originally from the same dress as this panel, is in the Winterthur collection (2004.53, sold by Cora Ginsburg LLC). Panels of identically patterned damask in a fawn colorway descended in the Dandridge family of Virginia and are thought to have been part of a gown worn by Martha Washington; these are in the collections of Colonial Williamsburg (G1975-342,1-4) and Mount Vernon (W-2078); see Linda Baumgarten, What Clothes Reveal (2002), p. 85. Robert Feke's 1746 portrait of Anne Shippen Willing (Mrs. Charles Willing), at Winterthur (1969.134), shows her wearing a gown made of a documented Garthwaite silk that is extremely similar to this one.
Very good to excellent condition; fold marks and light discoloration where it was formerly made up as part of a dress