Gros point needle lace border

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

Seventeenth-century lace has a voluminous character—rather than the light and airy form of later periods—reflecting an era when luxury was equated with grandeur. Here, a careful balance is achieved between the solid forms of the formalized leaves and flowers and the voids in between. The sculptural relief of this type of lace appealed to artists working in other media: Baroque lace appears in the work of the English sculptor of wood, Grinling Gibbons, as well as in the marble sculpture of Bernini. Lace of this type was made in several sizes—the boldest designs on the largest scale being known as gros point. Smaller-scale designs were called rose point and point de neige.

European Sculpture and Decorative Arts

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The fifty thousand objects in the Museum's comprehensive and historically important collection of European sculpture and decorative arts reflect the development of a number of art forms in Western European countries from the early fifteenth through the early twentieth century. The holdings include sculpture in many sizes and media, woodwork and furniture, ceramics and glass, metalwork and jewelry, horological and mathematical instruments, and tapestries and textiles. Ceramics made in Asia for export to European markets and sculpture and decorative arts produced in Latin America during this period are also included among these works.

Metropolitan Museum of Art