Over the years, I have read numerous articles addressing this issue. There are two "sub categories" IMHO, old collected lace and modern lace owned by the maker which has acquired the off-colors.
The causes that seem most plausible to me are... Old laces have been infamously exposed to conditions which leech off-gasses which cause discoloration to the natural fibers. Sadly, the people who caused the discoloration were acting in good faith that their "New and improved" background paper was Lace friendly! The second great offender is human handling! Unfortunately, when laces have been handled, but not protected, they tend to end up with blotches of ugly off-color. Today, if you are allowed to handle a piece of lace in a museum, you must wear carefully laundered Cotten gloves so the natural oils in your skin do not transfer to the lace. I have been mounting my own samples and the old ones I have bought on acid free paper. This tends to stabilize the changes. Clay Sent from my iPad > On Jun 28, 2017, at 8:45 AM, N.A. Neff <nancy.a.n...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Hello fellow spiders, > > Could someone explain to me what causes "age spots" on lace? the brown > spots? > > What is the actual chemical basis for them? > > Can they be removed? (I've been too chicken to try anything.) > > Can future ones be prevented from developing? > > Any other information I should be asking for? > > Thank you! > > Nancy > Connecticut, USA > > - > To unsubscribe send email to majord...@arachne.com containing the line: > unsubscribe lace y...@address.here. For help, write to > arachne.modera...@gmail.com. Photo site: > http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacemaker/sets/ - To unsubscribe send email to majord...@arachne.com containing the line: unsubscribe lace y...@address.here. For help, write to arachne.modera...@gmail.com. Photo site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacemaker/sets/
