I have always taken a copy of each pattern and made the pricking from that so that I have a true pattern to refer to. These days, you often receive a working diagram as well but when I started making lace back in the 80s, often you just bought the pricking photocopied onto a piece of paper with a rather dodgy photocopy of s small part of the actual lace squeezed into a corner.
The first time I saw coloured photocopies for sale was at the Springett's fair in the late 80s and these were on the Lace Guild Stand. We all thought it was very revolutionary and time saving to have the pattern in blue so you stick it to some card and put clear sticky plastic over the top. I remember being advised to go over the stick in plastic with wire wool to remove the shine. In the end, I've realised that it doesn't save me time to use a struck on pricking rather than to prick my self as you either make the holes as you go (which often means a sore finger from pushing the pins in or you miss the mark and the pattern goes from true) or as I do now when have to use film, I prick in advance just as I would have done with a pattern. However, I have had to used the stick and film method on a few pricking as because either they were very big and the chance of missing pin holes increased or they came as one of my pet hates as only part of the pattern or had been reduced to fit in a book. I particularly now avoid part patterns as they never seem to match when you copy the number of parts needed. The blue of the Lace Guild patterns back in the 80s always photocopied well. Ad recently I bought some Spanish prickings (which came pre-pricked) and these photocopied beautifully allowing me to have a copy of the pricking next to my work to check pin holes etc. these days, with scanner printers, the quality of the copy is far better and almost photographic. The only time I've had a problem making a copy of a pricking do I could use it as a working copy / diagram was with a UK supplier who had used a particular colour of paper for the pattern and when I took a copy every single hole disappeared, similar to Ruth's experience with the purple paper. I asked the author of the pattern if this was on purpose and she said yes because she had a big problem with people making copies for friends rather than buying a pricking themselves. I find that a sad indictment of today. Kind Regards Liz Baker On 2 Aug 2013, at 00:07, "Earl & Ruth Johnson" <ejohn...@magma.ca> wrote: <snipped> > I thought the pattern was sold on orange paper to discourage photocopying. I > bought a pattern book in Japan and the patterns, which were an insert to the > book, were printed on purple paper. Not wanting to work on the original, I > tried to photocopy it but colour photocopies are shiny. > Ruth Johnson > Ottawa, Ontario, Canada > - To unsubscribe send email to majord...@arachne.com containing the line: unsubscribe lace y...@address.here. For help, write to arachne.modera...@gmail.com. Photo site: http://www.flickr.com/photos/lacemaker/sets/
