Illustration: Bruges bobbin lace produced on the Schiffli embroidery machine.
Machine produced lace work did not appear until relatively late in the nineteenth century. It was one of the last textile crafts to be mechanised as it was one of the most difficult to formulate for mass manufacturing. All five examples shown here were produced on a Schiffli embroidery machine which was devised in Switzerland in the 1860s but became widespread in the 1870s.
Technically this particular form of machine lace work does not in fact deal in the production of lace itself, but is part of the embroidery technique. Schiffli machines were known as embroidery machines and that was their main purpose. However, it was soon discovered that if machine embroidery was placed on a chemically treated background fabric, and this fabric then disintegrated in a solution, a form of see through lace would be left. By interlocking the embroidery stitch the product could then stand-alone without unravelling as so often happens with modern machine embroidery.
Illustration: Duchess lace produced on the Schiffli embroidery machine.
Unfortunately for manufacturers, but a blessing for hand producers, much of the early lace tended towards the harsh and abrasive with many examples appearing more as robust net curtain fabric than lace for costume. However, the technique was effective and more importantly cheap, and as time progressed more finesse was added to the production, and same techniques are often still used today in the mass manufacture of lace.
It is interesting to note that the Schiffli embroidery machine only ever copied lace work superficially. It gave the impression of different forms of traditional lace work, but could never copy the technique and therefore treated the traditions of hand lace production as a form of visual effect, rather than constructive skill. However, the sheer range of styles and pattern work as shown in the five examples accompanying this article, goes to show the potential and eventual real damage done by this and other mass production machinery on Europe's hand lace industry.
The hand production of lace always struggled with the fickleness of the fashion market, with lace products drifting in and out of fashion as the generations passed. However, there was little that hand producers could do to compete adequately with the perfection of the mass production of machine lace, and the Schiffli machines, along with others like them, eventually placed the craft in a terminal decline. An important addition to the decline of hand lace production, was the increasingly unattractiveness of the amount of labour it took to complete even small amounts of hand lace, along with the paltry sums often paid by middle men for what was in effect a highly skilled craft. As women began to enter the workforce professionally in increasing numbers as the nineteenth century progressed, hand lace work began to appear as demeaning and traditionally limited work, by many young women.
Illustration: Irish crochet lace produced on the Schiffli embroidery machine.
For much of its life hand lace production very often had a status attachment to it, with different regions of Europe having more of a cachet with customers than others. For a while hand lace maintained its status driven market, particularly in the more traditionally led areas, and machine lace was limited to mass market consumption, very often in the form of ordinary domestic interior accessories rather than for the more exclusive elements of costume.
However, today there is little call for hand lace beyond the tourist market and even though there has seen an upsurge in hand craft over very recent years, hand lace production specifically, will always struggle due to its highly intensive labour rate and lack of immediate result. It is a craft skill for the dedicated and those that do not expect immediate results from labour spent.
Illustration: Point de France produced on the Schiffli embroidery machine.
One of the main and enduring differences between machine and hand production is the seemingly obvious human element. This human dimension has been seen in various times and by various individuals as both a good and bad element. Hand production for some was seen as a necessary connection with humanity and the creative individuality that makes every human piece of hand production completely unique and therefore different from the next. However, others have seen hand production as a clumsy means of production with individual products only being as good as the skills base of each individual involved.
To be fair, both viewpoints are equally valid. Hand production is an important, even vital element of what makes us human. However, we should also be aware that hand production can never fill the gap of the immediate needs of nearly seven billion people. We should also be aware that hand production can only ever be as good as the individual maker. Lack of skill both technically and within the design and decoration field, has often produced whole ranges of inadequate and badly made work that only reinforces the prejudicial mantra of craft equals crap.
Illustration: Point Play de Venise produced on the Schiffli embroidery machine.
To raise both the standard and public image of hand production seems more possible today than it has for a generation. Although some of the traditions such as lace, may well struggle to make headway, other factors including the work of various eco movements which have helped publicise ideas concerning sustainability, regional variation and a more inclusive attitude to production, have helped to reenergise hand craft. Although to be fair, it can only ever be a factor in contemporary design, the lack of pre-judgement by many young designers of the merits or otherwise of at least elements of hand production within the process of modern industry, has raised the level of craft to that of a professionalism it has not seen in a long while.
Further reading links:
How to Recognize Machine Laces
Identification of Lace (Shire Library)
Pictorial Archive of Lace Designs: 325 Historic Examples (Dover Pictorial Archive Series)
Antique Lace: Identifying Types and Techniques (Schiffer Book for Collectors)
Renaissance Patterns for Lace, Embroidery and Needlepoint (Dover Pictorial Archives)
Victorian Lace Today
Guide to Lace and Linens
Radical Lace & Subversive Knitting
The Case for Working with Your Hands, Or, Why Office Work Is Bad for Us and Fixing Things Feels Good
Shop Class as Soulcraft: An Inquiry Into the Value of Work
The Nature and Art of Workmanship
The Culture of Craft (Studies in Design and Material Culture)
The Art of the Maker: Skill and Its Meaning in Art, Craft and Design
The Craftsman
