The collection of late 16th-century embroidery, needlework and wrought linen at the National Trust’s Hardwick Hall in Derbyshire is the most important of its type in Britain, and probably in the Western World. Largely commissioned and acquired by the redoubtable Elizabeth, Countess of Shrewsbury – known as `Bess of Hardwick’ – these pieces, some 200 in total with many of the highest quality, range from small fragments of exquisite needlework to a dramatic set of huge wall hangings depicting `Heroic Women of the Ancient World