"Compared side by side on the same pattern lace made from silk is in my opinion far superior to cotton as I'm not a fan of the slubbish/fluffiness of cotton threads."
But this surely depends what you are using your lace for, and what cotton you use. As you are looking for fine silk equivalents, I guess you don't need to launder your lace much. Silk floss thread can get quite fluffy during work, unless you are a very meticulous lacemaker. I would agree that some linens are slubby, but the good cotton threads aren't. Mostly they aren't fluffy either until you get to magnifying glass examination. Have you looked at the Egytian Gassed Cottons which go right to 180 and should cover all the thicknesses available in silk? If you are happy to use thread made from bamboo, do you realise that this is normally rayon made by a chemical process rather than the natural fibre being spun? The bamboo fibres are very short (3mm) and so can't make a good lace thread naturally. I thought that Bart and Francis had said their was, but looking on their website it doesn't specify, and it is spun with silk which then disqualifies it for you anyway. I have used the Sulky, Madeira, Coates etc rayon threads a lot for lacemaking, and find that the 40 weight is constant across all makes giving an enormous colour range. For Milanese type patterns the finished lace is as stiff as the same motif in cotton or silk, and quite unlike the original slippy thread . For Torchon where there is more space between the threads then it gives a softer drape to the lace. You may however be looking for a finer thread than this. Jacquie in Lincolnshire - To unsubscribe send email to [email protected] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [email protected]. For help, write to [email protected]. Photo site: http://community.webshots.com/user/arachne2003
