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The earliest unmistakable documentation of bobbin lace is the pattern book of LePompe, published in 1559.  The woodcuts are clearly representations of bobbinlace designs, and can even be used still as a basis on which to make bobbin lace.  There are references in inventories of the late 1400s  to "bone lace" which was probably bobbin lace.  It is commonly believed that early lace makers used chicken leg bones to wind the thread on and manipulate the threads.  However it is also believed that early passamenterie - gold and silver braids meant to be laid onto the surface of velvet or brocade garments - used pig knuckle bones for the same purpose.  These passamenterie braids are probably the origin of bobbin lace.  We have no way of knowing what these "bone laces" referred to in the inventories looked like.

Contrary to what seems logical, bobbin lace did not start simple and become complex as the years passed.  Rather it shows complexity and variety of working methods from the very earliest.  The laces in LePompe are of three types:  the majority are braid based (plait based) straight laces.  Some of these show sections of cloth stitch to vary the texture and thickness of the lines of the design and some show five hole ground (Flanders ground) as the crossing of two braids (4 pairs).  The next largest number of laces are tape laces where a meandering strip  winds around making loops, and touching itself and attaching to itself (using the part lace structure). Some of these show tiny figures, which can only be made by hanging in and cutting out threads as needed (also using part lace structure). The third type are geometric straight laces where the woodcut shows little diamond shapes.  The most likely interpretation of these woodcuts would be torchon type laces (straight lace).   See Bobbin Lace: Two Structural Classes for an explanation of straight lace/part lace/mesh and guipure.

The history and development of bobbin lace is highly complex and tangled, which makes it fascinating.  In very broad terms one can divide its history into a few periods:

1559-1700 Early development of a variety of working methods and styles: Antwerp, Genoese, Milanese.  But only very rarely do laces of this age appear in private collections and I have almost no pictures to show you (only some I have made from LePompe patterns or other old laces).  (See below for red highlighted kinds.)  Many beautiful examples do exist in museums, including the Art Institute of Chicago.

1700-1790 The eighteenth century was the height of lace complexity, delicacy and fine quality in nearly all categories of construction and style.

Plain machine made net began to be possible in the 1780s, and the continued proliferation and availability of this clear net began to influence the style of handmade laces and provoked the development of new styles and working methods in bobbin lace (the use of clear machine made net as the background with handmade motifs appliqued onto it, began to be common c. 1825-1850), and also in hand embroidered laces (darned or chain stitched/tambour).

1790- c.1825 The Napoleonic era.  Laces of this period are distinct and quite different in style from earlier laces and are easily recognizable.

c. 1825-late 19th century.  The nineteenth century in general saw various attempts to design laces which would be quicker to work than the 18th century varieties.  Point ground laces dominated the mesh straight lace category for this reason.  It was much faster to work than the earlier complex grounds like Binche snowflake, Flanders or Paris.  New styles continued to develop, but in general they all show simpler structure which allows for greater speed in working.  The primary exception to this was the development of braid based laces in Bedfordshire, especially the Thomas Lester Bedfordshire, which were highly complex, detailed and difficult to make.

1890-1910 Revival era lace.  The time boundaries of this era may not be exactly these years, but was generally the late 19th and early 20th centuries.  During this period lace merchants, designers, and teachers were trying to inject life into an old industry, trying to keep it alive amidst clear signs that it was dying.   The efforts at designing faster laces, as was done during the 19th century generally, was found to be insufficient to achieve this.   They looked at old laces and tried to simplify the designs and working methods to make laces even faster.  They resurrected styles that had gone dormant and tried to design new pieces using some of those techniques.  For the most part revival era laces are stylistically distinct from their older sources, and somewhat simplified in working methods.  When the pieces were made into wearable objects clothing styles had changed since the 18th century and collars had to fit in with modern taste.  The shapes of these wearable laces changed from the shapes of the much older laces, and this is often the easiest way to distinguish them from their older parent.  But the merchants were trying to compete with machine made laces.  This was their mistake.  They were trying to sell lace as yard goods; they should have been marketing it as wearable art (or marketing it as modern high priced dress designers market their $20,000 dresses).  Much of the lace that modern lacemakers make is derived from these revival era versions.

After the first world war hand made bobbin lace virtually ceased.  There still were schools and teachers and some still continued making it, but there was no international trade and its use in fashion ceased, and it ceased to be a way of earning a living.

1970s to present: the New Revival.  In the 1970s there began a resurgence of interest in bobbin lace, but by hobbyists, not as a commercial venture.  These new lace makers started with the simpler laces, then moved on to the old Revival era types.  During the 1980s some designers began researching the old laces in museums and trying to make accurate patterns from these laces.  At first they focussed on 19th century laces.   There were several books published of point ground laces and Bedfordshire laces from small local museums.   But during the 1990s, and still continuing, they are studying and documenting the 18th and 17th century laces, making accurate and detailed diagrams of the most complex old laces and thus making them accessible to modern lacemakers.  But in addition to all this "retrieval" activity, some are also designing new laces using all the most complex old working methods, but with flower shapes and designs more in keeping with modern taste.  This is a very exciting time to be involved in bobbin lace.

Antwerp Pottenkant, Milanese tape lace and Flemish tape lace throw this neat list into disarray because they overlap several periods.  Pottenkant was an Antwerp straight lace which started in the mid 1600s, c. 1650.  According to Santina Levey it started as a high fashion lace, but fashion changed.  The old style continued to be made until about 1850 but the latter 75% of this time period it was sold to the peasantry as part of their costume, especially cap lace; but also was used locally as furnishing lace.  This makes it very difficult to date any particular piece with any accuracy.  The style stopped changing.  It is changes in style and the shapes of the pieces (dictated by fashion) that allow us to date laces.  When the lace ceases to follow this pattern of changing styles and shapes you can't pinpoint its time of origin.  A somewhat similar situation occurred with Flemish and Milanese tape laces, particularly the latter.  They were made continuously from about 1650 to about 1850.  But around 1700 the style and delicacy of fashion lace changed drastically.  Laces from the old patterns couldn't be sold as fashion laces, but were useful as furnishing linen and for church use. 

I have used Santina Levey's book LACE, A HISTORY, published 1983 by the Victoria and Albert Museum to develop my understanding of bobbin lace history.  Also, during the 1980s I did a lot of private study at the Art Institute of Chicago, viewing their bobbin lace collection under the microscope.  Just prior to the time I started this study Ms. Levey had been invited to identify and comment on their lace collection.  So the descriptions of the individual pieces that I heard from the staff were Levey's comments and interpretations.  The collection held nearly 1000 pieces of bobbin lace.  I saw several hundred, more actual examples than are in her book.

I have divided the photographs between several web pages so each page will load more quickly, while still trying to maintain historic cohesion.  Please be patient, there are a lot of photos and some of the pages are slow to load.

1559-1700      Pottenkant, Flemish and Milanese Tape Lace         Eighteenth Century        

Napoleonic Era       19th c Straight Bar Grounded Lace        19th c Straight Mesh Grounded Lace      19th c Part Lace   

   Revival Era Straight Lace      Revival Era Part Lace        New Revival Era

  Bobbin Lace Introduction       Bobbin Lace 2 Structures       Needlelace Introduction    

Contact me at     lhalley@bytemeusa.com