FIGURE, in the manufactures, is applied to the various designs represented or wrought on velvets, damasks, taffeties, satins, and other stuffs and cloths.
The most usual figures for such designs are flowers imitated from the life; or grotesques, and compartments of pure fancy. Representations of men, beasts, birds, and landscapes, have only been introduced since the taste for the Chinese stuffs, particularly those called surces, began to prevail among us. It is the woof of the stuff that forms the figures; the warp only serves for the ground. In working figured stuffs there is required a person to show the workman how far he must raise the threads of the warp, to represent the figure of the design with the woof, which is to be passed across between the threads thus raised. This some call reading the design.
For the figures on tapestry, brocade, &c. see TAPESTRY, &c.
For those given by the calendars, printers, &c. see CALENDAR, &c.