Bobbin lace is a lace textile made by and twisting lengths of yarn, which are wound on bobbins to manage them. As the work progresses, the weaving is held in place with pins set in a lace pillow, the placement of the pins usually determined by a pattern or pricking pinned on the pillow.
Bobbin lace is also known as pillow lace, because it was worked on a pillow, and bone lace, because early bobbins were made of bone[Oxford English Dictionary definition of "bone lace"] or ivory.
Bobbin lace is one of the two major categories of handmade laces, the other being needle lace, derived from earlier cutwork and reticella.
Origin
A will of 1493 by the Milanese Sforza family mentions lace created with twelve bobbins.
There are two books that represent the early known pattern descriptions for bobbin lace,
Le Pompe from
Venice and
Nüw Modelbuch from Zürich. Patterns from
Nüw Modelbuch can be examined with commentary, working diagrams, and completed examples to understand the styles.
Other popular lace pattern books were produced by Isabella Parasole, which included patterns for reticella, needle lace and bobbin lace designs. Other pattern books of this period include Cesare Vecellio
and Bartolomeo Danieli.
Bobbin lace evolved from passementerie or braid-making in 16th-century Italy.
The making of bobbin lace was easier to learn than the elaborate cutwork of the 16th century, and the tools and materials for making linen bobbin lace were inexpensive. There was a ready market for bobbin lace of all qualities, and women throughout Europe soon took up the craft which earned a better income than spinning, sewing, weaving or other home-based textile arts. Bobbin lace-making was established in , , and .
In the 17th century, the textile centers of Flanders and Normandy eclipsed Italy as the premiere sources for fine bobbin lace, but until the Industrial Revolution and the coming of mechanization hand-lacemaking continued to be practiced throughout Europe, suffering only in those periods of simplicity when lace itself fell out of fashion.
Some skilled lace makers work to re-create older lace patterns based on the period portraiture and extant lace samples.
Materials
Bobbin lace may be made with coarse or fine threads. Traditionally it was made with
linen,
silk,
wool, or, later,
cotton threads, or with precious metals. Bess of Hardwick bought red silk, gold, and silver thread for making "bone lace" in 1549, the earliest English reference to this kind of work.
[Santina M. Levey, 'References to Dress in the Earliest Account Book of Bess of Hardwick', Costume, 34:1 (2000), 21.] Today bobbin lace is made with a variety of
natural fiber and
and with wire and other filaments.
Even bobbin lace made from human hair, point tresse, was once popular as a personal memento.
Structure
Elements of bobbin lace may include
toile or
toilé (clothwork),
réseau (the net-like ground of continuous lace), fillings of
, tapes, gimp,
, tallies, ribs and rolls. Not all styles of bobbin lace include all these elements.
Traditional types
Many styles of lace were made in the heyday of lacemaking (approximately the 16th–18th centuries) before machine-made lace became available.
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Classification of traditional styles by technique
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Continuous bobbin lace also known as: straight lace or fil continu.
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Mesh grounded lace has motifs connected with ground
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too many types to repeat here
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Guipure lace has motifs connected with plaits
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Bedfordshire lace (Beds) – this has flowing lines and picots (to foil the lace machines)
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Cluny lace – has radiating long, thin leaves, called wheatears
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Maltese lace – often has the 8 pointed Maltese cross as part of the pattern
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Yak lace – made of wool
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Cantu Lace—also called Venetian Pointe lace
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Genoese lace – usually a geometric design
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Part lace
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Bobbin tape lace sometimes categorized as part lace (not to be confused with tape lace which uses prefabricated tapes)
Contemporary laces
The advent of
lace machine at first pushed lace-makers into more complicated designs beyond the capabilities of early machines, then simpler designs so they could compete on price, and finally pushed them out of business almost entirely.
The resurgence of lace-making is a recent phenomenon and is mostly done as a hobby. Lacemaking groups still meet in regions as varied as , England and Orange County, California.
Still new types of lace are being developed such as the 3D Rosalibre
A Dutch design graduate in 2006 discovered bobbin lace was a technique to make a fancy fence. The first fences became museum pieces. The fences are now produced in Bangalore by concrete rebar plaiters.
Tools
The major tools to make bobbin lace are a pillow, bobbins, pins and prickings. The part laces also require a crochet hook, very fine types of lace require very fine hooks. There are different types of pillows and bobbins linked to areas, eras and type of lace.
Bobbins
Bobbins, which are traditionally made of wood or bone, are used to hold the thread. They come in different shapes, often associated with certain types of lace. The parts of a bobbin are the neck, which is where the thread is wound, a head, where thread is hitched to keep it from coming unwound, and the shank, which is used as a handle. Bobbins from England may also have a beaded spangle at the end of the shank, which makes the bobbin heavier and helps with tensioning the thread.
Bobbins are usually 3 1/2 - 4 inches long, though they may be shorter or longer.
Bobbins are wound and used in pairs. Bobbin collection is a common aspect of the hobby for many lace makers. Within the lace community, commemorative bobbins designating annual meetings, special anniversaries, or historic events are frequently offered which become collector's items.
There are many types of bobbins, including:
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Belgian bobbins: They have a single head and a bulbous rounding near the end of the shank that helps with tensioning threads.
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Binche bobbins: The round bulb near the end of the shank is small, making these bobbins good for fine, straight laces.
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East Midlands bobbins: These double-headed bobbins are slender and spangled. They are also called Bucks or Midlands bobbins.
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Honiton bobbins: Honiton bobbins are straight below the single head, and the end of the shank comes to a blunt point, which helps with sewing. They may be called a lace stick.
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Square bobbins: Square bobbins have a shank with flattened sides, which makes it easier to keep them from rolling on the pillow.
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Portuguese bobbins: The bobbin is an elongated pear-shaped wooden artefact where the thread is wrapped.
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Bone bobbins are sometimes decorated with names, commemorative text, or other messages and patterns
Types of pillow
The pillows must be firm, or otherwise the pins will wobble. The pillows were traditionally stuffed with straw, but nowadays polystyrene (styrofoam) is generally used.
Pillows were historically characteristic of the different regions where lace was made, but contemporary lacemakers may have multiples styles of pillows to accomplish different lace styles and projects.
An early type of pillow can be seen in The Lace Maker by Caspar Netscher. The pillow has a wooden frame, and is slightly sloping. The lace-maker rests it on her lap. Another representation of the similar style of pillow is found in the painting The Lacemaker by Johannes Vermeer. The Lace-Maker portrait by Gabriël Metsu was memorialized in a postage stamp.
The bolster or cylindrical pillow was much cheaper to make as it is just a fabric bag stuffed with straw. It was used in Bedfordshire lace. It needs a stand as it does not have a flat bottom.
This problem (of the lace needing to be longer than the pillow) is solved in a different way by the roller pillow, which has a small roller, for working the lace, set into a larger area, where the bobbins are laid. This means that the pattern can be pinned round the roller, but the pillow has a flat bottom.
The cheapest modern pillow is domed and made of polystyrene (styrofoam). It is often called a cookie pillow, because of its shape. Another modern pillow is a block pillow, with a frame which holds covered polystyrene blocks. The blocks can be moved around as the lace progresses, to keep the lace being worked on at the centre of the pillow.
an early pillow with a wooden frame]]
(1744-1831) - The Lace Maker - Brighton Museum Art Gallery]]
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pillows and stands]]
Lacemaking organizations
Lacemaking is considered a folk art with technique and materials varying widely across the globe. Most lacemakers belong to
regional guilds within their country of origin. Guilds can be devoted to one kind of lace, often that which developed locally, or may include makers of all kinds. In the United States, most guilds are organized within chapters of the
International Organization of Lace, which also includes Canadian lace guilds. Quarterly publications of
"The Bulletin" journal provide articles about current projects and events, historical research, annual meeting details, patterns, and more. Internationally, the
Organisation Internationale de la Dentelle au Fuseau et à l'Aiguille (
OIDFA,
International Bobbin and Needle Lace Organization) is the primary governing and networking body for lacemakers. OIDFA organizes annual global congresses, regional fairs, and local gatherings to promote the appreciation and knowledge of lacemaking.
Further reading
External links
