Hi Jean: Thanks for this. Interesting to finally have some hard data in the lacemaking world!
I remember as a very new lacemaker, being haughtily told that a piece of Honiton I had made was actually something else (Whithof? Brussels?) because of the way I had done a join. I had taken the pattern from the "Devonia" book, which didn't have the best instructions, and I'd had to figure out that bit as best I could. I had no idea that my little efforts had 'ruined' the lace. I thought it looked nice. Adele West Vancouver, BC (west coast of Canada) > It's not as clear cut as that. I had a bursary from the Lace Guild to study > the techniques used in a book of fine Bedfordshire lace samples dating from > the 1860s. It had originally belonged to the Rose family, lace dealers in > Paulerspury, Northamptonshire. > > The book contained 870 samples, some duplicated so there were 729 samples in > all excluding exact matches. I found the that 38% had the Beds technique > mentioned above (30% only this technique) and 44% had the Cluny technique > (27% only this technique) and that 40% had variations of these techniques for > dealing with plaits joining and leaving trails. > > I think it's only since techniques have been published in books that the > sharp distinction between Beds and Cluny techniques has been made. The old > lacemakers, working to earn money, did whatever worked best to give an > acceptable result. - To unsubscribe send email to [email protected] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [email protected]. For help, write to [email protected]. Photo site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacemaker/sets/
