Hi Devon: The lace club I belong to (Vancouver Lace Club) started in 1955 but it was slow going at first because the ladies could only get instruction from a lacemaker who lived up the coast and only visited Vancouver once a year, to demonstrate lace at the Pacific National Exhibition. She would bring patterns with her and show the ladies how to make them. Books on lacemaking were rare. Finding a new book on lacemaking - any book at all - was a cause for celebration. Threads and bobbins were ordered from Theo Brejaart in Rotterdam - in this era before credit cards you had to be really determined to learn and to get your supplies.
Books: Doreen Wright: 1971 âBobbin Lace Making" Pam Nottingham: 1976 âTechnique of Bobbin Lace" Doris Southard: 1977 âBobbin Lace Making Elsie Luxton: 1979 âThe Technique of Honiton Lace" They were published by big publishers whose books your local bookstore could order. Once youâre into lacemaking, you find all the other avenues but only these larger publishers got their books into the libraries where the general public could find them - it was the picture on the cover of âTechnique of Bobbin Laceâ that drew me to lacemaking in 1982. I had never heard of it before, and never seen any handmade lace. Earlier books that showed lacemaking techniques were very basic (Th. de Dillmont) and were also difficult for people, like many North Americans, who needed to get all their knowledge and instruction from the book. In the early books the author tended to think that the student had seen bobbin lace before and just needed a bit more information. Hope somewhere in all this is a nugget you can use. Adele Shaak > Sue, your observation about taking a class in an adult school in England is > interesting. I think there was more of that in Great Britain than in the US at > the time. But, Holly van Sciver took an adult school class in England while > there for a college semester abroad. Eventually she was a large spur to the US > movement by sharing her skills through teaching, bobbin making, and vending, > so arguably the adult schools of England were instrumental in the development > of the lace movement in the US. > Devon - 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/
