My Mothers Favourate Dress

I brought this back to Spain with me it is one of my mothers dresses. I have decided to save the embroidery after discovering further moth damage and piece it together as a wall hanging. She must have had this garment made in Cairo; it is a full length dress that has been highly decorated with cross stitch on what looks to me to be based (literally) onto a traditional Islam ladies dress.
The black base fabric is really poor viscose in some parts, and rayon cotton mix in others. The dress was sewn together with violet thread which I thought was very odd. The most endearing part of dismantling it has been to find sand in the hems. I don?t imagine it was ever washed, it still smalls of her even though she died 2 years ago and she can not have worn this dress for at least 5 years.