(or at least as much as I know so far...)
by Keridwen the Mouse.
Originally, I thought that lace wasn’t ‘period’. When I think of lace, I think of the poncy cavaliers or regency types, not medieval. Lace did exist prior to 1600, however is appears that fixing a time when lace first appeared is very difficult for many reasons.
The origins of lace are hard to pinpoint.
Apparently some netting was found in an Egyptian tomb.
A pulled work cushion is shown in an Italian fresco in the 1330s.
Also St Catherine is found wearing a smock decorated with pulled work in
an alter piece by Crivelli in 1475.
However, lace doesn’t become common in
portraiture until the mid 16th Century and then only in early forms.
Lace reaches one of it’s many popular phases with the advent of
Elizabethan fashions. Lace has far
more styles and history post 1600 than it does in period, and the later history
obscures the early history (since it involves smuggling, politics and other
juicy stuff). Studying early lace
seems to require caution so that you reproduce real period styles, and not a
later copy of an earlier style.
One of the reasons lace is so hard to define, is because there are so many different ways to produce it. We think of lace as a decorative sort of material with lots of holes in it. But this can be produced by cutting holes out of material, plaiting threads, knotting threads, sewing over cords or a combination of the above. Lace can also be knitted, tatted, crocheted, made from sprang or even macrame!
One big problem is terminology. In period, lace was so new that there wasn’t even a word for it. A 1580s dictionary defines lace as something to tie one’s hat under one’s chin. And the words that they did use to describe lace were also used to describe other forms of needlework, and have also been used to describe different post-period forms of lace. There is mention in one book of Renaissance lace, which wasn’t produced in the Renaissance. Plus people used foreign words to describe the lace to make it seem more exotic and got the words all wrong.
Another problem in studying lace is the lack of a good book. I’ve found many modern books that demonstrate lace-making techniques (although most lace books are for bobbin lace rather than needle-lace). The history in these books is very hand-wavy and rarely backed up with documentation. And then there are the history books with many examples of period laces, but with no real instruction on how to make the stuff. So one must piece together one’s information, hoping to match the design and the techniques correctly.
Another confusion (am I complaining too much?) is that some forms of lace deliberately attempt to imitate another lace using a different technique. Early punto in aria and bobbin lace tried to imitate cutwork designs, for example. So if you were trying to reproduce some lace from a portrait, you could potentially use any one of three different techniques to produce the same effect.
The forms of lace developed slowly, one form merging into another, and sometimes techniques were combined on the one piece. Here is an idea of the styles which were common.
Pulled work – where holes are made in fabric by pulling stitches tight to separate threads.
Drawn work – where threads are removed from fabric. The edges and remaining warp or weft are sewn into patterns. Both of the above forms were also referred to as punto tirato, from the Italian tirare meaning pull.
Cutwork – where portions of material are removed and the edges and spaces decorated. It was also known as punto tagliato. Reticella is a form of cutwork, although the term reticella is also used to refer to some punto in aria work. The majority of lace in period seems to fall in this category.
Punto in aria – is where the lace is built from cords laid on parchment. The lace does not start with fabric but otherwise uses the same techniques as cutwork. One of the reasons that the term reticella is used for both cutwork and punto in aria, is that cutwork was more expensive, but punto in aria was faster and cheaper to produce, therefore merchants could get a higher profit for punto in aria sold as cutwork. Warning! The earliest mention of punto in aria, in 1520, referred to raised surface embroidery, not lace.
Bobbin lace – known in period accounts as bone lace. It seems that bobbin lace was frequently made from metal threads. Bobbin lace didn’t reach it’s heyday until after period. Lace for ruffs needed to be stiff, and needlelace was stiffer than bobbin lace. When falling collars became the fashion in the early 17th Century, bobbin lace became the favoured lace. Since this article is about needle-made lace, I won’t mention much more about it.
Lacis – lace form by darning stitches on a knotted net.
Buratto – the same as lacis but worked on a coarse woven material (burato means sieve or coarse cloth in Italian)
It is not known exactly when or how lace developed. It appears to be the culmination of several decorative ideas developing simultaneously and eventually combined. The origins of lace seem to stem from the growing use of linen as a visible part of dress and its use in furnishings in the late 15th and early 16th centuries. Lace developed and became an industry in Italy and Flanders, and in Italy the lace production was closely links to the convents.
The edges of the linen was sometimes decorated with needlework, or by crimping or pleating it using laundering techniques. Sometimes the edges of the linen was decorated with beads or tufts or loops of cord. Eventually these evolved into small needle-made loops and projections.
The surface of the linen was decorated with whitework with relied on texture to reveal the pattern. Eventually, this evolved into pulled, drawn and early cutwork.
Seems were decorated. This eventually became more elaborate open zigzag lacings joining the edges of material.
Tassels, fringing and macrame style work are being used to decorate the edges of material. These sort of ideas were used with bobbin lace.
Lacis had a different development cycle. Nets were used since ancient times for fishing and hunting. In medieval times, darned decorative nets were used as hair nets, girdles and some trimmings. Lacis became more popular in the 16th Century and was used for clothing and large scale furnishings.
Lace was a purely decorative fabric, initially made from linen, but eventually was made with white and coloured silk, metal threads, or even black threads. Lace was used as decoration for handkerchiefs, collars, cuffs, ruffs, coifs, partlets, veils and household furnishing.
The development of lace can be traced partially through the published pattern books. Pattern books were sold to the amateur needleworker to be used to copy the styles already popular. Lacis appeared in pattern books from the 1520s. The first cutwork in a pattern book was in the 1540’s. True reticella (and punto in aria – more space than stitches) didn’t appear until the 1580s. Bobbin lace first appeared in a pattern book in 1559.
Here is an attempt to give you an idea of the techniques used to create needlelace. As I’ve mentioned previously, these instructions have been gathered from modern books, and as I haven’t been able to study real period lace, I must trust that the techniques have remained the same.
For cutwork, you start by sewing around the edges with satin stitch. Then cut away the unnecessary material. Where the lines cross the pattern, you leave some of the fabric threads (probably four or eight). These are then woven into a bar with needle and thread.
The methods for sewing diagonal and curved lines are similar to each other. You take the thread from start point to end point, back to start and then back to the end point. The line should now be covered by three threads. You then work your way back to the start point using whipped stitch (for straight lines) or buttonhole stitch (for curved lines).
The short lines on the pattern indicate picots, which are made using french knots, or short button hole covered bars.
The solid areas of the pattern are filled in using closely worked buttonhole stitches.
Punto in aria uses the same techniques, except it doesn’t start with fabric. You start by drawing the design onto parchment or cardboard. A cord is couched down over the major lines. Work then continues as for cutwork. Once the stitching is finished, the couching stitches are removed.
Lacis and buratto starts with netting. You can find instructions for making the net in various books, and woven net can be purchased. From studying a picture of a piece apparently sewn by Mary, Queen of Scots, different darning stitches were used to create different textures. It would seem that one of the attractions of lacis, was to work out how to traverse the pattern without retracting the path or going through the blank grids.
In period, linen thread was mostly used to make lace. These days there isn’t a huge variety of linen thread available, so it would seem that the modern lace maker is forced to use cotton (or silk if you are feeling confident). I’ve managed to sew cutwork using a round hoop, but the square pattern eventually gets distorted. I would recommend a small square frame for sewing cutwork, lacis or burato. Punto in aria uses the parchment to keep it stiff, so I don’t think a frame is necessary.
Obviously there isn’t enough information here to tell you everything about how to make needlelaces. I still consider myself to be a beginner in this, but you have to start somewhere. I hope this inspires you to go out and have a go, and learn by doing. Once you have perfected the art, then let me know what you have discovered.
Researching period laces is a challenging subject. The development of lace happened over many years, and records of its early development are rare. It is possible that lace was made in very early times, but to be sure, I’d stick to patterns and methods for which there is surviving evidence.
This research project has been enlightening about techniques I thought were developed quite recently. It has also shown me how hard it is to define something neatly when it has slowly mutated over a hundred years. It seems impossible to define all the different types of lace, when multiple techniques are used often in the same piece.
Collier, Anne, (1986), The Art of Lace Making, Bracken Books, London.
Only
half of this book is needlelace and only a small amount of that is pre 1600.
Good diagrams and explanations that matched up.
A small amount of lace history.
Earnshaw, Pat, (1988), Needlemade Laces (Materials, Designs, Techniques), Collins Australia, Sydney.
Lots
of needlelace techniques, with good diagrams, but the pictures of lace were all
modern and didn’t correspond well with the text. Some history of the laces.
Levy, Santina M., (1990), Lace, A History, Victoria and Albert Museum, W.S. Maney and Son Limited, Leeds.
The
lace ‘bible’. This book is very
scholarly and a difficult read. The
are few black and white definitions and few generalisations.
Evidence is drawn from pattern books, account books, portraits and
surviving pieces of lace. It
presents only the evidence that does exist, leaving the reader to fill in the
gaps themselves. This sort of
thinking is hard work…
Preston, Doris Campbell, (1984), Needle-made Laces and Net Embroideries, Dover Publications Inc, New York.
This
book was originally published in 1938, and is an amusing read for its
‘tone’. Very good diagrams and
explanations. The history presented
could almost be fiction however.
Swain, Margaret, (1986), The Needlework of Mary Queen of Scots, Ruth Bean, Bedford.
Primarily
about Mary and her needlework, but has some pictures and diagrams of lacis,
which was made by Mary and Catherine di Medici.
Warner, Pamela, (1991), Embroidery – A History, B.T. Batsford, London.
Primarily
a book on embroidery with a chapter on needlelace. A good overview of the history of needlelace, but little
information on the techniques.
Wright, Thomas (1982), The Romance of the Lace Pillow, Ruth Bean, Bedford.
First published in 1919. This aims to be a historical study of lace and is probably
pretty good for its time. It tries
to show the spread of lace with political upheavals of the time. Some of the facts however, seem to come from old sayings that
have a tenuous link to lace. No
techniques or diagrams are given.