Bobbins of Belgium: A book of Belgian lace, lace-workers, lace-schools and lace-villagesKellogg, Charlotte
History
Bobbins of Belgium: A book of Belgian lace, lace-workers, lace-schools and lace-villages
Kellogg, Charlotte
Brussels lace committee; Lace and lace making -- Belgium
They then outlined the two years’ work, which they made to include
classes in practical lace-making, in design, in commerce and English,
in the history of lace-making, and religion. Because the two years’
course was already over-crowded they did not attempt to teach the
needle points, which, according to them, do not demand a system of
instruction in the same sense that the bobbin laces require it.
Besides, they look upon bobbin lace as more uniquely Belgian and as
therefore more necessary to develop. Dr. Rubbens of Zele, farther east,
plans soon to have a needle lace Normal School in operation in that
town.
In the first year class, a demonstration of the use of the tools, the
winding-wheel, the cushion and bobbins is followed at once by the study
of the Torchons, which tho they are the commonest known laces, yet
in all their varieties employ all the more important lace processes.
The Torchons once thoroughly mastered, the student has traveled a
considerable distance on the lace journey. The study of Torchon is
succeeded by Cluny in all its varieties and Cluny is in turn followed
by a kind of barbaric Russian lace, of baroque design, which is,
like the Torchons and Clunys, made of linen thread, and resembles
them closely in other ways. The finer laces, Valenciennes, Duchesse,
Flanders, and others are taught only after these first three groups
have been mastered.
Along with the actual lace-making, the students follow courses in
design, where they begin first with simple studies in geometry and
in drawing. They then execute geometric designs and adapt them to
lace-making. From these studies they proceed to drawing from nature,
and to what is more difficult, the adaption of the drawings from nature
to lace designs, for it is one thing to create a beautiful flower and
leaf arabesque, and quite another thing to draw it so that it may be
exprest in thread.
The important classes in commerce and English and those in history and
religion run parallel with the studies in lace-making and design.
Of great value to these future teachers of Belgium is the model
practise school across the court from the main rooms, where at four
o’clock each day the poorer children of the neighborhood come to be
taught. Each has her cushion and bobbins and pins and thread furnished
by the Normal, and enjoys all the advantages offered by its excellent
system; while the coming teachers find here the opportunity to perfect
their methods.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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