Silk silk during the Medieval age. The first center to introduce silk production to Italy was the city of Catanzaro during the 11th century in the region of Calabria. The silk of Catanzaro supplied almost all of Europe and was sold in a large market fair in the port of Reggio Calabria, to Spanish, Venetian, Genovese and Dutch merchants. Catanzaro became the lace capital of the world with a large silkworm breeding facility that produced all the laces and linens used in the Vatican. The city was world-famous for its fine fabrication of silks, velvets, damasks and brocades. Another notable center
Silk industry of Cheshire largest collection in Europe. These were burnt when the department closed. Hand embroidery was a cottage craft, Augustus William Hewetson came to Macclesfield at fourteen, on the death of his father. He studied at the School of Art and at 21, he purchased four Swiss pantograph machines and set up business as a machine embroiderer in George Street in 1898, moving to Albion Mill in 1904. There were seven mills built in Cheshire to throw silk before 1780. Two were in Congleton on the River Dane. John Clayton and Nathaniel Pattison's silk mill, the Old Mill, was built in 1753