Vandyke point lace sample

This Devon made needle-lace sample is part of a collection of British and Continental lace put together by Charlotte Treadwin, an important lace manufacturer with a business based in the Cathedral Yard, Exeter. The collection was donated to the museum in the late 1860s for lace-makers and designers to study. Treadwin once stated that there was not a single lace-designer in the whole of Devon, and strove to improve this, employing an artist to draw out her designs, and studying samples to better inform her practice and experimentation with lace-making patterns and techniques. By 1868, the lace manufactory and showrooms were already based at 5 Cathedral Yard (now known as the Cathedral Close).

The business had already been granted the royal warrant from Queen Victoria in 1848, before Charlotte’s marriage to John Treadwin. Antique laces were fashionable and widely admired, especially in the second half of the 19th century. Women could purchase lace made in a revival style if they did not own heirloom pieces. This sample may represent a record of a new design reviving an old technique and demonstrates that Treadwin was interested in developing needle-lace designs as well as working in a more traditional way with bobbins and pillow. She was the author of Antique Point and Honiton Lace published in 1873.

This design may have been inspired by carved lace decoration on the tomb of Lady Doddridge 1614, in the Lady Chapel in Exeter Cathedral. The lace collar and cuffs on this effigy and that of a tomb of similar date in the church at Colyton were also recorded and illustrated by Frances Bury Palliser in her book A History of Lace.

Object Summary

Accession Loan No.
29/2006/142
Category
Decorative Art
Collection Class
Textiles and equipment
Material
cotton
Common Name
Vandyke point lace sample
Simple Name
lace sample
Production Town
Exeter
Production County
Devon
Production Country
United Kingdom: England
Production Person Initials
Charlotte
Production Person Surname
Treadwin
Production Year Low
1850
Production Year High
1890

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Vandyke point lace sample