Few pictures are more qualified to situate Thomas Wijck in his home city of Haarlem than a drawing of a weaver at a loom, illuminated by vivid daylight. A Weaver at Work (Figure 2.1) depicts a harness loom, used to produce the fine linen cloth for which Haarlem became famous in the first quarter of the seventeenth century. A weaver sits amidst the contraption's inner workings, but it is the loom itself—architecturally imposing, subtly shaded in a light ink wash, and rendered in all its mechanical specificity—that dominates the composition and is the work's true subject. Wijck's drawing includes familiar workshop accessories such as the suspended hourglass on the right, a reminder of long hours of labor; but it also captures the loom's complexity and demanding technicality, suggesting that the weaver within is both diligent and highly skilled. The copious production of images of weavers and weaving in Haarlem—including works by Wijck, Cornelis Bega, Gillis Rombouts, Cornelis Decker, and numerous others—speaks to the city's rapidly growing textile trade, but also to local artists’ innovative adaptations of older trade imagery to suit a shifting market.