On Oct 21, 2005, at 15:08, Helen wrote:
Everyone else here who's a beginner seems to be making torchon. Do most people start on torchon and am I slightly odd for starting with Beds? OTOH, I did buy a torchon book from eBay at the beginning of the summer, but none of the patterns have jumped out at me as "must-makes", unlike a couple of the patterns in the Beds book I've got, so it's probably a good thing.
I started with Torchon simply because, for several months, that was the only book I had. The longer I worked with it, the lesss I liked the lace style - Torchon is far too angular for my taste and most of the patterns weren't all that inspiring, either - but I was too hooked on the process to quit (the first 6 months or so, I used to spend up to 10hrs a day at the pillow - both men in my life learnt to hate the very sight of it <g>).
Even after I discovered that Dover carried some books on lacemaking, the first one I got was Bridget Cook's "Practical Skills in BL" - a book which proved priceless later on, but which seemed like a mistake at first, because it wasn't a teaching manual. So I kept on with Torchon. But I never regretted that "imposed servitude" <g>
As Robin said, the 45 degree grid is the easiest to follow. And through Torchon, I acquired enough skills to allow me to branch off into other laces with very little trouble (other than the fear of half-stitch, which took a long time to get rid of) later on - things specific to a particular lace became a small add-on to an existing structure. I don't believe that doing it other way around - ie starting with some other lace - would have served me as well.
And there was another thing to consider in my specific case... For the first 8 months, until I dscovered IOLI and their vendor ads, I had no access to lacemaking supplies (my pillow was home made, my bobbins hand carved and spangled with beads obtained by dismembering the earrings, necklaces and bracelets bought at our local charity shop), and that included thread. The moment I began to get books on other laces (originally also from Dover), I ran into the problem of thread (that was before Brenda and her "Threads for Lace", which I think of as "Guide to Substitutes" <g>). But, with Torchon, it wasn't a problem, at least not using the book I had... It had a nice little index at the end, which told me what threads were suitable for different grid sizes (and grids themselves, in several sizes, were supplied at the end of the book also), irrespective of what the thread was used in the pattern. The index listed pearl cotton and DMC cordonnet and sewing thread. All of which were available at the embroidery shop (we still had one then), within a 2 mile walk... :)
PS Robin, a version of your "head and foot" was the 3rd project in the book I was using, after a "bandage" of sorts - hst and cloth in 2 colours- to be used as a bookmark (that's where my long-abiding fear of half stitch rows started <g>). The 2nd project was a trimming for a pillowcase, in three colours, in Torchon ground: hst, pin, hst (including at the sides, which made it into an insertion of sorts, or a bookmark, which is what I chose, being impatient to go on). The 3rd project was "the Footside", in whole stitch. A natural progression from the hst-pin-hst, differing only in being pinless. It also provided a welcome relief after the first two - one made with 7 prs and the second one with 10 (sheesh, there's not enough room on my pillow for 10 pairs! <g>) - in that it was made with just 4; two p.prs (of one colour) and two workers. One side had a straight footside (swap the workers) and the other "twist 3" one. To decorate the pincushion... I really loved that one, because the pairs stayed as pairs (as in the ground exercise), and because the T3 turn-around looked almost like scallops, which, for me, was what lace was all about :)
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