Nathalie asked...
Why was lace white from the beginning?
Why was the white colour dominant through the centuries and even nowadays?
If I remember correctly from something I read on the history of lace - that
some of the early laces were made in silver and also in red.
Don't remember where I read it!!
When I started making lace (from a book on my own, with only 6 pairs of
bobbins), I heard of a teacher who came from Toronto to Ottawa to teach.
Unfortunately I was busy the weekend she came, but did make contact and took
the pieces I'd been making to see if I was on the right track. The teacher,
with a very snooty air, said "It isn't very good is it. Of course, most of
the problem is because you are using the wrong thread. You should be using
unbleached or half bleached linen." I'd never even heard of what she was
talking about and I was using cotton - very coarse, but then so was my
pricking. I didn't use linen, unbleached, half bleached or bleached, for
many years, but did make lots of good lace. And by the way, we started a
group with the people who were taking the course. Of those who were there,
I only know of 1 person who still makes lace 30 years later. And the way
she taught....... Some of the people who were at the course were still
struggling with the bookmark she had started them on months and months later
because they didn't have any of the basics and she worked like a whirling
dervish the whole weekend and basically worked each row with each student
and they had no idea of what they were doing or why or what the stitches
were called.
Malvary in Ottawa where it is 27c and starting to get a bit humid.
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