Above music: Maiden Maiden by Gemma Khawaja. Lyrics by Ulysses Black. The little puppet prototype pictured is the character of the lace merchant. The lacemakers were commissioned to make lace by lace merchants or dealers. These merchants would order particular patterns or styles of lace and travelled from village to village, supplying the lacemakers with …
Audio above: Recording of a lace machine by Gemma Khawaja with added accompaniment I spoke to Richard Brawn, who trained as an apprentice lace mechanic and spent ten years (1964-74) working in an engineering shop specialising in lace machinery – maintaining the machines, overhauling them and replacing parts. Richard was one of the engineers …
Above image supplied by The Higgins Bedford. Postcard by Braggins and Co. Copyright belongs to The Higgins Bedford. The following information was given to me by The Higgins Bedford regarding Bedfordshire lace schools: Eaton Socon overseers entry 1596 Goodwife Clarke paid 2d a week for teaching each child and children received what they earned. Children …
Back in the heyday of handmade lace, it was an extremely valuable commodity. There were also sumptuary laws which stopped people of certain classes wearing lace, plus wearing lace from a foreign country was often banned. In A History of Lace, Fanny Bury Palliser writes: “…When a deceased clergyman was conveyed from the Low Countries for internment, …
Above: Gemma Khawaja’s version of Needlepin, a lace tell. The Lacemaking Tells are unaccompanied counting songs and rhymes sung/chanted by young lacemakers, particularly used in the lace schools, when they are first being taught to make lace. These songs tended to be made up of fragments of ballads, nursery rhymes and sometimes even hymns, and …
Saint Catherine According to the legend, St Catherine of Alexandria was a virgin martyr who converted to Christianity and was imprisoned tortured, sent to be broken on the wheel (which shattered at her touch) and eventually beheaded. Because of her association with the wheel, she is the patron saint of wheelwrights and other crafts people, …
Jack, be nimble! Jack, be quick! Jack, jump over The candlestick! Jack jumped high, Jack jumped low, Jack jumped over And burned his toe! In some parts of Northamptonshire, Buckinghamshire and Bedfordshire the lace-makers’ feast day was St Catterns Day (St Catherine’s Day) on November 25th. St Catherine was the patron saint of lace-makers (and …
Bobbin Lace is a type of lace made by twisting and plaiting threads using bobbins – small sticks usually made from wood – which are used to weave them together. This weaving is held in place by pins, the position of which is usually determined by a pattern or pricking, onto a pillow. The pillow …