What an interesting conversation about the strange lace piece I have encountered. Jo Ann believes it is needle lace. I think that is understandable as you could achieve this effect or something like it with needle weaving, as in Halas lace. But, the fact that the tape can transition seamlessly into a plait based structure, see first photo, makes me think it is bobbin lace. I think the long tapes are made the way we make tallies. They look like tallies in that they are âweft facedâ, namely the warp is totally covered by the weft or worker thread. (Linen stitch is a double weft weave, two threads going back and forth. The tally is single weft, one thread is going back and forth)
The piece in the Smithsonian that Karen draws our attention to is fantastic, a real tour de force in this technique. Again, I am questioning whether it might be needle woven, but it too has plait based sections. While the bird has parts that look like tallies, weft faced, it also has areas that look like a very even weave. Are these made the same way as the tally tapes? In tallies you are constantly tensioning and pressuring the worker to compact. I guess you could do the same movements, but without the extreme tensioning in order to create the impact of a woven fabric. It was this fabric type effect that caused me to think about the flower pot lace that I posted next on Ning. This is a piece with both the compacted tally type tape and also a more even weave type of tape. These transition into bobbin lace grounds effortlessly in this piece as well. The final piece that I posted was one with three flowers made in tally technique. This one even has a pair, or sometimes a braid which migrates through the tally to other tallies. Returning to the bird piece that Karen drew our attention to, I am enthralled by this portion of it where an even weave worked like a curved tally separates at the eye hole, and turns into a Giant Plait before turning into a pointed tally in the beak. I am including a photo of the very old piece that was made with tapes and motifs which were all plaited, or woven diagonally, or whatever you want to call it. (I call it a Giant Plait.) Kimâs insight that the elongated tally may be a very old way of making tapes seems very likely. Karenâs piece illustrates the incredible skill of the old lacemakers as they move through these various structures. These were classified as bobbin lace. I have posted photos to go with this on http://laceioli.ning.com/group/identification-history I am still confused about how you would be tensioning such long tallies, let alone the woven areas, since it does not appear that there are pin holes. Any insights would be appreciated. Devon > > - To unsubscribe send email to majord...@arachne.com containing the line: unsubscribe lace y...@address.here. For help, write to arachne.modera...@gmail.com. Photo site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacemaker/sets/
