Disney's Sleeping Beauty and Medieval Tapestries: The Art Behind the Movie
- Dr. Lauren Kilroy-Ewbank
- Feb 5
- 4 min read
Updated: Feb 20
One of the most enchanting moments in Disney’s Sleeping Beauty (1959) is when Aurora dances and sings in the woods, surrounded by animals and the beauty of nature. While this scene is undeniably magical, it also has a fascinating art history connection: it was inspired by a medieval tapestry housed at The Cloisters in New York City.
Art director Eyvind Earle looked to this tapestry, along with others from the same era, to shape the distinctive visual style of the film.
The Medieval Tapestry at The Cloisters
The tapestry that inspired Sleeping Beauty was created between 1500 and 1530, during the late medieval period. It depicts a pastoral scene featuring a shepherd and shepherdess surrounded by a lush, idyllic landscape filled with animals, plants, and flowers.
The shepherd plays music while the shepherdess sings, a theme of love and courtship that closely mirrors the interaction between Aurora and Prince Philip in the woods.
Earle and the Disney team translated this medieval scene into animation, capturing the intricate details of the tapestry’s flora and fauna. The forest in Sleeping Beauty is not just a backdrop; it’s alive with carefully rendered trees, flowers, and animals, all echoing the tapestry’s rich and ornate design.
There is a name for this dense design of tiny flowers and plants, and it is millefleur. This French word means "thousand flowers," and it is applied to that dense patterning of flowers and plants, such as we see in the Shepherd and Shepherdess Making Music. Millefleur tapestries became popular in France in the 15th century, and other very well-known tapestries from this period demonstrate this same style, such as the famous Unicorn Tapestries at The Cloisters in New York City and the Lady with a Unicorn at the Cluny Museum in Paris.
The influence of millefleur tapestries is present in other moments in the movie too. If you look closely at the opening shot of the movie, the jeweled manuscript rests before a tapestry that copies the Lady with a Unicorn tapestry.
Influence of the Unicorn Tapestries
In addition to the pastoral tapestry showing a shepherd and shepherdess, Earle and his team were partly inspired by the famous Unicorn Tapestries, also housed at The Cloisters. These late medieval tapestries depict scenes of a hunt for a unicorn, set in dense forests filled with flowers and wildlife. The careful attention to botanical details in the tapestries greatly influenced the aesthetic of Sleeping Beauty’s enchanted forest.
The Unicorn Tapestries are renowned for their symbolic richness (there is a lot one could say about that unicorn!) and intricate craftsmanship. Similarly, Sleeping Beauty’s visuals are characterized by their elaborate patterns, designs, and a palette that echoes the dark jewel tones of the tapestries. This combination of medieval art inspiration and Disney animation created a unique, timeless look for the film.
In fact, before Earle and his team looked to the shepherd and shepherdess tapestry, it was the Unicorn Tapestries that were slated to become the main inspiration for the film's aesthetic at the behest of John Hench, an important right-hand-man to Walt Disney. But it was later decided, apparently, that the unicorn tapestries didn't focus enough on love and courtship between a man and woman. [1]
Eyvind Earle’s Artistic Vision
Eyvind Earle, the visionary art director behind Sleeping Beauty, was known for his love meticulous approach to design. He wanted the film to stand out visually, and he achieved this by blending medieval aesthetics with modern animation techniques. He was known as so meticulous that he went from an assistant background painter to Artistic Director of Sleeping Beauty's backgrounds during its production.
Earle’s work on the forest scenes is a testament to his ability to translate the intricate, decorative quality of medieval tapestries into a moving, cinematic experience. The flat, stylized forms and detailed textures in the backgrounds give the film a storybook-like quality.
Disney's Sleeping Beauty and Medieval Tapestries
By drawing inspiration from medieval tapestries, Eyvind Earle and the Disney animators created a world for Aurora that feels both magical and historically rich. Next time you watch Sleeping Beauty, take a moment to appreciate the detailed backgrounds and their medieval roots. You will definitely notice the relationship between Disney's Sleeping Beauty and medieval tapestries.
Notes:
[1] See Wolf Buchard, Inspiring Walt Disney: The Animation of French Decorative Arts (New York City: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2021).
CITE THIS PAGE: Kilroy-Ewbank, Dr. Lauren. "Disney's Sleeping Beauty and Medieval Tapestries: The Art Behind the Movie." February 5, 2025. lkilroyewbank.com <Insert date you accessed> https://www.lkilroyewbank.com/post/disney-sleeping-beauty-and-medieval-tapestries
Learn more
I highly recommend Larisa Grollemond and Bryan C. Keene, The Fantasy of the Middle Ages: An Epic Journey through Imaginary Medieval Worlds (Los Angeles: J. Paul Getty Museum, 2022).
Read more about the Unicorn Tapestries in Adolfo Salvatore Cavallo's The Unicorn Tapestries in The Metropolitan Museum of Art (Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1998). Also read Barbara Drake Boehm's A Blessing of Unicorns: The Paris and Cloisters Tapestries (2020).
Want to know more about tapestries? The Metropolitan Museum's Tapestry in the Renaissance: Art and Magnificence (2002) is a great place to start.
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