J.R. BURROWS & COMPANY:
A brief history of Scottish Nottingham Lace and Madras Muslin
with an explanation of 'point' qualities and details of their use.
Nottingham lace is a form of machine woven bobbin lace that was developed in England in the 1840s. By the 1870s Scottish weavers produced the majority of Nottingham Lace curtain panels.
 |
| 14 point lace - Renaissance panel |
The name derives from the English midlands city where the majority of British woven lace was sent for finishing. Nottingham was one world's major lace markets in the 19th century. In the late 20th century finishing (post-weaving production) facilities were established in Scotland and today these products are marketed as Scottish Lace. J.R. Burrows & Company works exclusively with renowned Scottish weavers to reproduce lace panels from the most exalted heritage of lace curtains in the late Victorian era and early 20th century. Simply put, the number of 'points' of a woven lace is how many threads per inch are worked on the weft of the loom. Burrows Studio curtains are woven as 8 point, 10 point and 14 point lace.
8 point is a heavier weave that has a bold characteristic and was used to imitate hand-made bobbin lace and 19th century nets with distinct details of contrasting solids and voids. Many of our most beautiful Victorian and Arts & Crafts movement designs are woven as 8 point lace. 'The Stag' was designed as an 10 point lace weave that allows for a complexity of patterns within the design and still has distinct areas of opaque figures and open filigree.
14 point panels have fine lines created by closely woven delicate fibers. This quality is particularly well suited for capturing the detailed artistry of designs such as 'Honeybee' by Candace Wheeler. I think of point count in terms of 'laciness:' the higher point lace weave forms a lighter and smoother textile that has a more overall shear quality which is suitable for interpreting flat pattern, while the lower point lace weave permits for more robust patterns with heavier stitches and more distinct openwork that imitates antique lace. The artists who create our designs and draft the production work have made careful selections of design weight and weaving quality to best suit each individual pattern. Although the higher point count creates a finer, i.e. closely woven, fabric, we consider t
 |
| 8 point lace - Neo-Grec panel |
he different qualities to have their own merits for specific patterns.
Madras muslin has a fine weave with fuzzy edges that soften the design, while Nottingham lace can have precise and fine edges to figures. Both textiles can be woven into intricate patterns of similar refinement, although the surface effect that catches and reflects light differs. For comparison please contrast our 'Renaissance' panels, a design which is offered in both weaves.
 |
| 10 point lace - The Stag panel |
Plain and figured muslin were fashionable fabrics for curtains in the early to mid-19th century. Machine lace briefly overtook muslin in popularity in the third quarter of the century, but for high-end decorating the fashion for muslins, particularly figured muslins, revived in the late 1800s.
Catharine Beecher and Harriet Beecher Stowe (The American Woman's Home: or, Principles of Domestic Science, Boston: H.A. Brown & Co., 1869) recommend white muslin curtains with box lambrequins, or pendent curtain-tops made of chintz. "The curtains can be made of plain white muslin, or some of the many styles that come for this purpose. If plain muslin is used, you can ornament them with hems an inch in width, in which insert a strip of gingham or chambray of the same color as your chintz. The influence of white-muslin curtains in giving an air of grace and elegance to a room is astonishing. White curtains really create a room out of nothing. No matter how coarse the muslin, so it be white and hang in graceful folds, there is a charm in it that supplies the want of multitudes of other things. Very pretty curtain-muslin can be bought at thirty-seven cents a yard. It requires six yards for a window."
Muslin curtains, both plain and figured, were in high fashion during the first half of the 19th century. Large machine bobbin-net looms, that were invented in the 1840s and 1850s, and which wove a variety of products including Nottingham lace, created major competition for madras for window curtains. By 1880 Nottingham lace was manufactured in vast quantities and design critics tagged machine lace as a working and middle class product.
In the 1870s Alexander Morton sought to improve the manufacture and marketing of figured muslin, an important industry in his native county of Ayrshire, Scotland. Morton invented a power loom for weaving figured muslin in the mid-1870s and his business flourished. The name Madras muslin was adopted by the trade in reference to the popularity of this fabric in the export market of the Indian port city of Madras. For Aesthetic and Arts & Crafts designers the heritage of figured muslin had a particular appeal. By the early 1880s Madras muslin was being praised as the "simple fabric, now in vogue" and luminaries such as William Morris created patterns for this textile.
This form of cloth has had various names in the textile trade including leno weave muslin and leno gauze. It is produced and marketed by a Scottish lace manufacturer and since the early 20th century Madras muslin has been commonly called Madras lace. Confusion on technical terms caused C.L. Clifford, author of The Lace Dictionary (New York, 1913), to write emphatically, "Madras, a commercial term for a curtain material, not a lace." Burrows & Company uses the original Victorian term of Madras muslin for this product.
|
J.R. Burrows & Company celebrates it's 25th anniversary
supplying the finest lace panels for period, revival and homes.
|
Lace Curtains, Practical Advice
Cut Yardage (Lace)
Go to Burrow Studio Design List
How to Order Our Lace Curtains
Shipping & Return Policy
J.R.
Burrows & Company
P.O. Box 522
Rockland, Massachusetts 02370
E-mail: john@burrows.com
Phone (Toll Free): (800) 347-1795
Phone: (781) 982-1812, Ext. 3
Fax: (781) 982-1636