Pat Earnshaw's "Dictionary of Lace" states:
Pita. A fibre obtained from the century plant used for both bobbin and
knitted lace in the Azores. See Aloe. In Madeira in the twentieth
century, the texture was copied using starched cotton.
Aloe. A group of sub-tropical plants, some of the lily family, others
of the Amaryllidaceae (daffodil family). The latter includes the
century plant, Agave americana. In all of them there is a huge basal
cluster of fleshy leaves, and from these the aloe fibres used in
lacemaking are obtained. In Paraguay a kind of sun lace similar to
nanduti was made until the early twentieth century; from the 1840s
openwork stockings and shawls of extremely fine knitting were made in
the Azores; and in the Philipines simple rosette designs were made by
plaiting and tatting. Small amounts of aloe were also used in Spain,
Portugal and parts of Italy. The fibres from teh liliaceous plants
become extremely gummy on contact with water and so are completely
unpractical, except for tourist souvenirs. The fibres from the century
plant - sometimes known as pita fibres - can be washed in soap and
water provided they are not, while wet, exposed to a hot sun."
In Earnshaw's "Identification of Lace" there is a picture of a 120cm
knitted mat described as "Pita lace from the Azores"
SO, pita lace describes the fibre and not the style or technique.
Sharon, can you put a picture of this lace onto a web page? or send me
a scan/photo and I'll put it onto my website so that the combined
Arachne wisdom can advise as to how it was worked.
Brenda
On 18 Dec 2005, at 22:25, Debora Lustgarten wrote:
Hello,
According to "Hispanic Lace and Lace-making" by Florence Lewis May,
published by The Hispanic Society of America, Pita lace is a type of
lace made in the Azores Islands, which are a Portuguese colony, and
the fibre comes from agave plants. There is also a mention of lace
made with aloe fibers, but I think that may not be the proper plant...
Sadly, the book doesn't mention whether the lace is bobbin lace,
needle lace, crochet or what.
On an interesting note, in the Philipines, lace was also made using
pineaple fibres...
Debora Lustgarten
At 01:53 PM 12/18/2005, you wrote:
Last night a fellow lacemaker was showing me a new addtion to her lace
collection. The little doily was labelled "pita lace". It was a most
beautiful airy little thing, like a delicate spider web. Neither of
us has
ever heard of pita lace before, it really looked like a super-fine
knitting.
where bobbin lace would have a half stitch trail this had what looked
like
"perl stitch"..perhaps needle lace would have this? One feature was a
series of little bobbles made up of bundles of thread. I ssumed they
were
made by winding the thread around a small tool, maybe a needle, and
then
they had a couple more extra rounds to keep the shape. They were
only about
an eighth of an inch across. Can anyone enlighten us on this
particular
lace? Thanks Sharon on cold, frosty, slippery, Vancouver Island
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Brenda
http://paternoster.orpheusweb.co.uk/
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