Draught for a machine lace tablecloth

 

This is a draught, or the instructions, for a tablecloth to be made on the Nottingham lace curtain machine. The first step in producing this type of lace is to design the pattern, which is done by the designer drawing freehand onto paper. That design is then passed to the draughtsman who converts it into the draught, essentially by digitising the design into a series of squares, which are recorded on graph paper by hand painting the individual squares. The draught forms the coded instructions for the lace machine. It is then sent to the card puncher who produces a set of jacquard cards based on the draught, which are then used in the production of the lace.

The draught also includes hand written instructions including the size of the lace; this piece is 36 inches square. The written notes also specify that this tablecloth should be made in ‘single action filet’, meaning that it will resemble handmade filet lace when it is made. All Nottingham curtain lace is made in a series of blocks but they can be open or closed and thick or thin giving an appearance of shading. However when making single action filet lace all the blocks tend to be fairly solid, emphasising their similarity to handmade filet lace. There is also a stamp on the back of the draught giving the Nottingham address of the firm of designer draughtsmen who made it, as well as the pattern number and the date (April 1970). So this lovely image includes a wealth of information.

Lace napery and tablecloths

 

As part of my research into machine made lace I’ve recently been reading about the history of the Simon May lace company, which was based in Nottingham but had many branches worldwide. I was surprised to discover that their napery department, a general term for table linen of all types, was only inaugurated in 1920. This surprised me as tablecloths were made using the Nottingham lace curtain machine and I assumed curtains and tablecloths would have been part of the same department. I also knew Simon May had been producing curtains since the middle of the nineteenth century. However, further reading about this napery department showed that it produced dinner and luncheon sets, tea cloths, runners, and dressing table sets with lace insertions, edgings or embroidery. So it seems that in this department they were making motifs and edgings rather than tablecloths. This section of the book is also illustrated with a photograph of a lace tablecloth so it wasn’t just me who was confused! Another interesting image accompanying the article shows rows of women working at what look like sewing machines presumably making up the table mats. Subsequent reading revealed that tablecloths and mats were indeed made in the curtain department but the ones requiring hand finishing were made in the napery section – puzzle solved!