Belgian war lace tablecloth

 

This needlelace image of St George fighting the dragon is part of a tablecloth made for Queen Elisabeth of Belgium as part of the Belgian war lace initiative. The project was set up in 1914, at the start of the First World War, to provide aid for the Belgian population. As a result of the German invasion and occupation of Belgium, the British had established a naval blockade to cut off German supply routes, but this also led to a shortage of food imports. In response, the Commission for the Relief of Belgium (CRB) was set up. This body, with the help of thousands of volunteers, organised the importation of food aid and provided a basic meal of soup and bread for millions of people over the four years of the war.

As part of the relief work, lace committees were set up to buy lace from local lacemakers but, by 1915, a shortage of thread from Ireland and Britain was limiting the amount of lace that could be made. It was then that the CRB rules were amended to allow the importation of a certain weight of thread and the export of the same weight of lace to France, Britain and the USA for sale. This provided the thread the lacemakers needed and opened up new  markets for the sale of the lace. The Brussels Lace Committee (BLC) oversaw the entire lace project and employed about 45,000 lacemakers as well as professional designers.

The tablecloth was designed by the well known Belgian artist Isidore de Rudder and incorporates images of four saints. St George and St Elisabeth of Hungary represent the Belgian King and Queen and St Gudula and St Michael are the patron saints of Brussels. There are also references to battles in which the King took part and the coats of arms of 16 Belgian cities particularly affected by the fighting.

The borders include ferns and wildflowers referencing the forests and fields of Belgium. As well as seaweed to remember the breaching of the dykes at the River Yser in 1914 which had halted the German advance. The outer border of the tablecloth includes medallions of flowers and mushrooms symbolising qualities such as rebirth, humility and immortality. The tablecloth was made at the convent lace school in Erenbodeghem and presented to Queen Elisabeth by the BLC, at the end of the war, on her return to Belgium from exile. It is now held in the Royal Museum of Art and History in Brussels.  

Wedding veils that conceal and reveal

 

These wedding veils are part of a series that conceal hidden thoughts and reveal them only to those who can see the clues. The one in the image above is called ‘Paper trail’ and was inspired by Thomas Hardy’s novel Tess of the D’Urbevilles. It references the note that Tess wrote to Angel Clare on the evening before their marriage and slipped under his door, telling him about her past, in case that knowledge would cause him to change his mind. Unfortunately he did not find the note, but Tess was relieved because she thought he knew about her past and still wanted to marry her. It is only after they are married that she realises her mistake and, sadly, when she confesses her chequered past to him he rejects her.

The disintegrating paper in the veil represents the overlooked note and the hidden secrets it contained as well as reflecting on the fragility of her marriage. Although the veil appears to be delicate and beautiful, like Tess herself, it hides within its folds intimations of decay and the unravelling of the marriage and her life. The confusion caused by this scrap of paper initiates a paper trail that ends in Tess’s trial and sad end.

This lace veil entitled ‘Fragmented memories’ is inspired by a nineteenth century author rather than a particular novel. It is a veil for Charlotte Bronte, the author of Jane Eyre. At the age of 38 she married Arthur Nicholls, who had worked with her father as a curate. However, before that she had had an intense crush on Constantin Heger, a schoolmaster in Brussels, where she went to study for a while. When she returned to England, she wrote to him obsessively, much to his embarrassment, and the displeasure of his wife, and he had to ask her to stop writing to him. Constantin tore up all of the letters Charlotte wrote to him, but his wife collected the pieces and sewed them together so she could read them.

The veil references that time in Charlette’s life, by including torn pieces of a letter on to the lace edging of the veil. They are linked by a line of stitching to record the way they were stitched back together and to suggest that they remained part of Charlotte’s past life as fragmented memories.

Lace doilies with attitude

I like to give a voice to lace that is generally overlooked and ignored and these three doilies are part of a series of mats with attitude that speak their minds. The inspiration was gothic literature from the 19th century in which the ideal heroines are outwardly quiet, well behaved and often seated at their embroidery frame and unable to voice their opinions. In some respects the doilies are embodiments of those women. Doilies are also anachronistic furnishings. Whereas they were once ubiquitous in family homes they now languish in the charity shop or under a pile of old tablecloths in a cupboard; unwanted and unused.

Get off me, seemed to reflect the fact that they are essentially table mats, constantly being pinned down by vases, glasses or plates and that they might like to throw off this burden occasionally and experience freedom. I designed this one in Bedfordshire style lace with the hint of a ninepin edging and leaves breaking the inner circle of the mat suggesting the promise of escape.

#MeToo was made as a response to the 2017 social movement and campaign to raise awareness of sexual abuse and harassment. It encouraged women to share their experiences of sexual harassment, particularly that in the workplace, and to emphasise the widespread prevalence of the problem. This doily was designed by combining a Bedfordshire style central panel and an outer ring of Russian style tape lace.  

F**k off was chosen as the text for the third panel as that is the common response from young women today to those who harass or annoy them. It is a universally understood slang phrase which gains more effect by being quoted on a dainty, old fashioned doily where a platitude about the home would be more likely to appear. This design also has a central panel of text, leaves and plaits, surrounded by a tape lace outer circle. The lace doilies form a group of traditional furnishings with attitude that aren’t afraid to speak their minds. 

Handmade or machine-made lace?

 

The first question most people ask about a piece of lace is ‘Is it made by hand or machine?’ With most types of lace it is fairly easy to tell, but with Chantilly lace it is always difficult to decide because the machine-made versions were such clever copies. This type of bobbin lace was first made in the northern French town of Chantilly in about 1840 and was popular for shawls, lappets, parasols and flounces until the end of the 19th century. It is a very fine lace that is time-consuming to make, so separate strips of the lace were made by different workers and then sewn together using an almost invisible stitch called point de raccroc. This forms a weak point in the lace and sometimes this stitching unravels revealing the join between the sections. Finding these gaps indicates that the lace was handmade because machine-made pieces do not have these joins.

Another way to decide if the lace is handmade is to follow some of the thread paths. In handmade lace you can follow the threads from one section of the work to another, for example in this piece the threads form a continuous line from the floral shapes into the ground net. In handmade lace the thicker outlining gimp threads are also incorporated into the stitches on the edges of the floral design elements. The threads that make up the picots along the edge of the lace should also come from the body of the lace rather than being a separate addition and form loops rather than just thread ends. Handmade lace often feels softer than machine-made lace, which can feel hard to the touch and may drape less well.

People generally value handmade over machine-made lace, probably because they understand the skill that would be required to make the lace and realise how difficult it would be. However we should not dismiss the skill of those who produced machines to make lace and the designers, draughtsmen and twist hands who made the machine lace. We tend to think that machine-made things are worth less because they are plentiful and cheap. However, machine-made lace allowed more people to own and wear beautiful lace at an affordable price.

Bobbin lace mat of the Dorsetshire Regiment badge

 

I have carried out quite a lot of research into war lace, including the Battle of Britain machine-lace panel and the war lace made in Belgium in the First World War, so I was intrigued to find this lace mat which looked as if it was celebrating a battle. I was so interested that I bought it and started some research when I got home.

It turns out it is a depiction of the type of regimental cap badge that was used by soldiers in the Dorsetshire regiment of the British army from 1900 to 1951. The regiment was originally formed in 1702, under a different name, and underwent several changes over the years. Then, in about 1898, the badge was redesigned to reflect some of the battle honours the soldiers had achieved.

The castle and key (the top of the key is the circle immediately under the castle) mark the Great Siege of Gibraltar from 1779-1783. The scroll under the castle includes the Latin inscription Primus in Indis (First in India) to acknowledge that the regiment was the first British Regiment to serve in India in 1754.

The sphinx at the top of the design and the words Marabout under it refer to a battle during the Egyptian Campaign on 21 August 1802. The design of the castle and key is surrounded by a wreath of laurels and the scroll at the bottom is inscribed Dorsetshire. The mat is made of handmade bobbin lace and was probably designed by someone who had a relative serving in the regiment. It is well designed, and I’m impressed by the way the lacemaker has achieved the lettering. Having designed bobbin lace patterns with text in them I know how difficult it is to ensure the words are legible. I like the way she has depicted the bricks of the castle and the parts of the sphinx with a series of twisted threads, and the centres of the leaves too. 

I think the piece was worked in two parts. First, the outer circle including the laurels, sphinx and lettering and, second, the central panel with the castle and key. The lacemaker then sewed the central panel inside the outer ring with an oversewing stitch linking the two edges. I find that method of joining the two parts interesting, because I would have looped pairs into the inner edge of the outer circle and worked the central panel in situ, to ensure it fitted the space correctly. It suggests to me that perhaps two people were working on this piece at the same time, may be a mother and daughter as a reminder of a husband and father far away in the army. However, the place where the beginning of the outer lace circle meets the end of the lace is also joined by oversewing, rather than looping the threads through the starting pinholes, so perhaps it was made by one person and that was just the method she used to join pieces of lace – I will probably never know!

Lace curtain designs inspired by handmade lace

 

Lace curtains were popular furnishings in the early 20th century and a 1904 catalogue from the Peach lacemaking company of Nottingham includes many examples. The detail in the image above comes from a wide store curtain which would have been hung flat across a large sash window. It is 52 inches wide and costs 3/9 for a pair of curtains 3 yards long and 4/6 for a pair 3.5 yards long.

The curtain is actually advertised as a ‘copy of old lace’. This is advertising blurb so I don’t think we are meant to think that the curtain itself is an exact copy of old lace, it just means the designer was inspired by old lace, which in this context refers to handmade lace.

This piece of old Bedfordshire lace shows the serrated ninepin edging, scrolls, floral shapes and fillings which are characteristic of this type of lace. Looking at the curtain, you can clearly see the influences of handmade lace in the scroll which runs down both sides and across the lower part. It does look as if it is a piece of Beds lace with its bold lines, serrated edge, flower shapes and filling stitches. The palmette shapes within each loop also look like motifs taken from a handmade piece of lace.

This curtain is also inspired by handmade lace. It is slightly wider than the one above at 60 inches and again is available in two lengths costing 4/6 for a pair of curtains 3 yards long and 5/6 for a pair 3.5 yards long.

Again you can see from the detail, how the designer was inspired by handmade lace. The scrolls look very similar to Beds lace with their serrated edges and the flowers and small scrolls joined by bars also resemble the shapes and joins, which in Beds lace include plaits and crossings or spider joins. The edging of the curtain with its scrolls, flowers and filling stitches also references handmade lace. At this time handmade lace was experiencing a revival and many people were also interested in antique lace and how it was made. There were regular exhibitions of lace, some of which included demonstrations of lacemaking. Lace was sold at these events, but it was expensive, therefore buying lace curtains inspired by handmade lace was a more economical way to be fashionable.

Lace folding fans

 

Folding fans developed in China and Japan and were introduced to Europe in the late 16th century, where they became high status fashion items. The basic folding fan is made up of a series of sticks with two larger outer sticks known as guards. They can be made of many materials  including ivory, wood, or metal and are all held together at the base with a rivet. The material attached to the upper part of the sticks is called the leaf and it can be made from a variety of materials including paper, silk or lace. When the fan is held open, the leaf is a wide flat area which lends itself well to a pictorial design. Many leaves were painted with beautiful images while others were designed to be ephemeral and were printed with political massages or advertising slogans, however, the lace designs we are looking at were expensive fashion accessories. The fan at the top of the blog was displayed in the recent Marie Antoinette exhibition at the V&A and features an Alençon lace leaf and gilded ivory sticks; it was made between 1750 and 1800. Alençon was one of the most prestigious types of needlelace and was mainly bought by the nobility. Mrs Palliser in her famous History of lace notes that a Russian princess paid the equivalent of £6000 for a set of flounce, lappets, trimmings, handkerchief, fan and parasol cover all made in Alençon lace (however, as a lacemaker who appreciates the work involved I think the princess got a bargain!).

Fan leaves are designed to be folded quite tightly so are only suitable for fine types of lace. Point de gaze lace was another expensive lace that was used for fan leaves. This example was made in Belgium in the 1860s and shows the intricate details in the lace, worked round the central image of the coat of arms.

This black silk bobbin lace was probably made in Bayeux in France in the 1870s. Again it is a fine lace that can be easily folded. Although lace on clothing was not very fashionable at this time, lace fans were popular and at the Paris exhibition of 1878, more lace fans were exhibited than any other type of fan.

By the 1880s the Irish lace industry was flourishing and this beautiful Carrickmacross lace fan with mother-of-pearl sticks  was made between 1870 and 1890. This is an applique lace where small pieces of fabric are applied to a net base and other filling stitches and embellishments added with needlelace.

Machine made lace was also used to produce fan leaves and this example from the 1890s shows the type of lovely design that could be made on the Levers lace machine.

This beautiful lace fan leaf was also made in Ireland. It was designed by Sister Mary Regis and made at the Presentation Convent at Youghal. It was shown at the Chicago exhibition of 1893 with another fan design by Sister Mary Regis. This exhibition was a show case for the very best examples of arts and crafts from around the world and was a fitting place to display this beautifully designed and exquisitely made needlelace fan. In the 19th century most lace fans were used as accessories for evening wear and this fashion continued until about 1914. As this small selection shows, floral designs were popular throughout the decades and their flowing lines were beautifully captured in lace.