On Jan 12, 2007, at 15:13, Alice Howell wrote:
I was told by one person that at least 2 repeats extra should be made.
Drives me *nuts*, when I hear instructions refer to the number of repeats :) Not only for the overlap (Het lassen) method of joining but, more often, for when it's safe to start removing pins from the already made lace. Ditto for the number ofnecessary inches or centimeters.
The number of repeats and measurements in inches (or cm) are totally meaningless. Some repeats are 5 (footside) pinholes long and some are 50... Depending on the lace, thread thickness and grid (pinhole spacing) you can have 4 pins per inch or 22... I spent a long time banging my head against a wall when I read, in some book on miniature lace (can't remember which one), that one should work the threads back for half an inch to finish. Hellloooo? Some of those pieces are not much longer than half an inch, but pack a lot of "security locks" (stitches) in that short space...
The requirements of how much extra to make for Het lassen and when it's safe to start removing pins are not the same. With Het lassen, more depends on the pattern. You want to have at least one cloth-stitched motif repeated and as little ground as possible; jagged lines which follow the motifs closely are, usually, the safest as well as least obtrusive.
For safe pin removal I find that anything between 6 and 10 (footside) pins is likely to be fairly safe, irrespective of the lace pattern (ie, after 10 footside pins, even cloth stitch -- in trails or motifs -- is "safe", not just the highly twisted ground). Whether those 10 pins take up 2+ inches of linear space or only a third of an inch, makes no difference. Whether those 10 pins account for 3 repeats or for only a quarter of one, makes no difference... It's the *number of stitches* that makes a difference.
OK. I'm done with venting for the night :) Aurelia Loveman wrote:
One of our most illustrious and celebrated lace teachers* has been known to remark that a minute and tiny detail is not noticed in the larger context of a beautiful piece of lace. Whether the tiny detail is the somewhat thickened texture of the Het Lassen join, or the somewhat simpler edge-seam, who is going to look at the lace and see a nearly invisible and insignificant detail?
OK, I don't know who that might have been, but will never forget Giusiana on the same subject, when I took a class from him (Flanders) in Ithaca several years ago. He kept pushing us to work faster and to forget un-doing and re-doing bits that we've messed up (well... it was only the *minor* messes that he encouraged us to overlook <g>) because he wanted us to put ourselves into the shoes of the long-ago, professional lacemakers. His, rather pithy, argument was: "only one person is going to pay any attention to a mistake in the lace applied to milady's pegnoir, and that's milady herself. Her husband -- who will have paid for it -- may get a look at the lace, but from a distance. Her lover, who's likely to have a chance to get a closer look, will not look at the *lace*. If he does, he gets his walking papers. And milady is not likely to know enough about lacemaking to spot a mistake"
So, no flak from me, either. You do what you have to, if there's no other way out. I must admit that, usually, I stop and weigh the cons and the pros of "undo/redo" vs "forget it, push on" and that "push on, heedless" is not always my choice, but that depends on personality, now that we no longer have to make money out of lacemaking (ie time isn't as precious and neither is thread, should it break)
-- Tamara P Duvall http://t-n-lace.net/ Lexington, Virginia, USA (Formerly of Warsaw, Poland) - To unsubscribe send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED] containing the line: unsubscribe lace [EMAIL PROTECTED] For help, write to [EMAIL PROTECTED]