Relief moulded decoration made by methods used for textile printing blocks. This printing block for silk cloth was specially made as an exhibition piece for the Science Museum in London by Mrs J A Noble. It is intended to show the fineness of detail that can be achieved with block printing. Printing blocks consisted of a mahogany or oak base with a thin face of more expensive boxwood. The pattern is drawn on reverse on the boxwood and then cut out by hand. By about 1900 block printing had been superceded by rotary printing.