Guided discovery path
Follow a line
What happens when you trace a single contour, burin groove, or graphite stroke from edge to edge?
6 works across collections
Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum / New York
How does a drawing prepare an object—or a plate transfer a pattern?
An engraved copper plate presses a narrative scene onto plain-weave cotton. A graphite sheet works out the proportions and lion-paw feet of a writing table. Embroidered silk threads build a repeating border on linen. Here, design is visible in the decisions before and during making.
Browse 100 selected works →Have five minutes? / An Artologium looking sequence
Before and after the surface
Three works, three pauses. These questions invite close looking; they do not propose a historical connection between the objects.
Dites Merci (copper-plate printed cotton)Meillier et Cie · ca. 1798Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum · CC0 Full supplied image / A looking promptOriginal museum record ↗Fine engraved lines on woven cotton.
Dense parallel hatching—typical of copper-plate engraving on paper—meets the warp and weft of plain-weave cotton, holding both architectural framing and small narrative gestures.
01 / Press
Dites Merci (copper-plate printed cotton)
Look closely at the fine hatching inside the foliage and figures. How does an engraved metal plate behave differently when pressed into cloth?
Look closely & read the record →
Design for Writing Table No. 2 and Lion-Paw FeetA.N. Davenport Co. · 1900–05Cooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum · CC0 02 / Measure
Design for Writing Table No. 2 and Lion-Paw Feet
Compare the full table elevation with the enlarged detail of the foot beside it. What does a working drawing need to show a maker?
Look closely & read the record →
Embroidered bandMaker unrecorded · 17th centuryCooper Hewitt, Smithsonian Design Museum · CC0 03 / Follow
Embroidered band
Follow the repeating floral scroll from left to right. How does the grid of the linen ground steady the curved silk stitching?
Look closely & read the record →
Cross-collection routes & claim boundaries
Where this collection meets the rest of the site.
Current Afterlives dossiers cite specific records from The Met, Cleveland, and Chicago. Works from Cooper Hewitt participate directly in our guided discovery paths and cross-collection record comparisons without implying unverified historical transmission.
Guided discovery path
Notice what repeats
How do repeated marks turn into rhythm, pattern, or time?
6 works across collections
Guided discovery path
How blue behaves
What changes when blue is printed from wood, exposed by light, dyed into cotton, or brushed in oil?
5 works across collections
What is here / 100 selected works
A partial view.
An open door.
Our 100-work selection draws on Cooper Hewitt’s open-access holdings across drawings, prints, textiles, ceramics and decorative arts. Catalogue terms distinguish the material of an object from the technique used to mark it.
Collection sources & reuse
Every selected image links to its museum record and CC0 dedication. The image’s source control includes its accession, original file and credit.