On May 15, 2006, at 13:47, [EMAIL PROTECTED] (Devon) wrote:
I think that you may find that you have to focus on couturier clothes
of the
past if you want to link them with bobbin lace and even this is not
particularly straight forward since the lace was often distinctly
separate from the
dress. (In fact, I am thinking the entire concept of Couture is sort
of a 20th
century concept and past the era of hand made bobbin lace in fashion.
Perhaps I am wrong.)
I don't think you are. My guess is that Charles Worth (the House of
Worth) is, probably, the first designer that could be named a
couturier, and he died in 1895. As a matter of fact... :) I just
Googled him and one of the entries starts with:
Charles Worth and Haute Couture's birth 1858. ...
By which time, the lacemaking machines were working full tilt; had been
for 40 yrs or more. True, handmade lace was still being made
professionally, but it was fighting the rear guard against assault of
the cheaper stuff. And against the awe of, and delight in, the human
ingenuity which was capable of desiging such machines.
I expect that, early on, machine-made lace had a "novelty cachet" that
hand-made didn't (didn't one of the American First Ladies wear, on her
husband's inauguration, a dress of machine-made lace given to her by a
Nottingham factory?). Which I suspect is the reason why you see little
(if any) hand-made lace in the early Haute Couture (including the
AngloMania Met exhibit)
--
Tamara P Duvall http://t-n-lace.net/
Lexington, Virginia, USA (Formerly of Warsaw, Poland)
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