If you look to later emails, you will see that she provided the list in the
body of her next email. Good list, with a good number of suppliers, with their
towns. Came out a bit garbled, but it is actually a chart, with each line
numbered. I cut and pasted the whole thing into my word processor program, and
arranged the columns, then saved it. Now I have it for future reference.
Last time I looked for lace places was in 2007, for a 4 week camping trip in
France, solo, with the theme of looking for lace places. An amazing trip. At
that point few places had websites. Now almost all do. If there is a website,
I think it helps to take a look, if nothing else to see what is generally sold.
For example, several websites sell beginner's packages which include Ulrike
Lohr's (Voelker) book, Kloppelkurs. You can buy this here at both of my go-to
online lace suppliers, AND there is a translation available. Invaluable,
believe me, as I bought it before the translation, and spent fruitless hours
translating until I got the lace glossary, which has lace terms, (never
included in a standard dictionary) in 9 languages. Don't know if the glossary
is still in print. I learned lace the second time from this book, and it was
very good. Also, you can see possible bobbin types. Clearly the hooded
bobbin, the one with a sleeve over the bottom part, is very popula
r. But there are several other bobbin types. And then there are the pillows.
Clearly the German traditional pillow is the bolster type, which is completely
round, and sits on a stand. Then, as I also saw in France, the popular modern
pillow is a block pillow, in all its variations. If you know that, and perhaps
something about prices, your shopping in a particular country will be more
fruitful, because you'll know what's there, what's generally available, where
it might be found, what you can get at home, price differences, if any, and
even what you want. Books, of course, are another matter, and are always my
downfall. I had to pay overweight fees for my luggage on the way home from
France. Of course I did have a pillow, innumerable books, and the head of a
French pitchfork in my luggage, as well as a dibble (specialized gardening
tool) and an asparagus weeder, all of iron. But I could part with none.
I don't think lace suppliers with a store list everything they have. And a lot
of it is sold worldwide. But it's those treasures, like the keychain patterns
I picked up in Linkoping in Sweden, that are such fun. Always ask for lace
supply stores, preferably in the native language, of different people,
including the shop you are in. Lacemaking is not necessarily a national
pastime, so the information you are looking for may not be universally known.
Another thing which may be as applicable to Germany as it is in France. Bobbin
types are peculiar to a region. You can count on everyone in a certain place
using 'their' style of bobbin, so it will be for sale there in that town or
region, but perhaps nowhere else in the country. In America, if one is
choosing a Continental bobbin style, it will be a personal preference. In
France, at least, that is not so. And the little shop in Benalmadena, Spain,
only sold one style of bobbin, as if that were the only one available, so it is
probably the case there as well. How it is in Germany, I am not sure, but it
certainly might be so.
Bottom line, as with all travel, is to research well. One of the things I did
in Sweden, to appease D,DH, was to research model train stores, so we each had
an interest. Reduced complaints and sighs to a minimum. Using the google
translating tool makes this fairly simple. I cut and paste interesting sites
onto a page in my wordprocessing program, so I have the list on one page, with
phone numbers, address, website. I also looked up the location on an online
map, and transferred it to a map I took along. Very helpful. But don't
overlook those serendipitous finds, in shops where only a bit of it is for
lacemaking. Those can be the best of all.
I have found travel with a theme, such as lace, very rewarding, as it takes you
to places you might not have gone, off the tourist trail, into a world that is
actually somewhat familiar, albeit halfway around the world. My travel jacket
is a blazer (4 inside pockets) where I put a lace hankie, solid Torchon,
(pattern from a book purchased in Seattle, totally in Japanese) in the breast
pocket, attached with a thread to the inside, so I can show people what I mean.
This is the second time I made the hankie, which is why it is now attached by a
safety pin and 20/2 linen thread to the jacket.
Lyn in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, US, where the weather is just about perfect for
spring. Tea on the patio after the taxes are finished.
-Original Message-
>From: Marilyn Vogl
>Sent: Apr 14, 2011 10:40 AM
>To: lynrbai...@desupernet.net
>Subject: German suppliers
>