12 Modern Lessons Learned From Antique Crocheted Lace
by Terri Wells
When PieceWork ran its crocheted lace challenge in the May/June 2009 issue, I found it impossible to resist. It featured two patterns originally published between 1885 and 1915. The issuer of the challenge, Linda Ligon, admittedly preferred knitting to crochet and claimed that she had problems making heads or tails of either pattern. Could somebody produce “a creditable version” of either of the two patterns? The carrot offered by Ligon, who founded Interweave and is PieceWork's creative director, was publication in a future issue.
I've been a crocheter for more than three decades; in fact, it's the first craft I ever learned. I've crocheted everything from bulky yarn and strips of fabric all the way down to thread so fine you could sew with it; I've even crocheted with wire. On top of that, I was about to take an 11-day trip touring several canyons in Arizona and Utah, which meant I'd spend plenty of time in a car with room to crochet. So I figured I was fairly well-prepared to tackle these lace patterns.
Well, yes and no. I'm still not finished with this project, though the end is in sight. I ran into a number of snags, which inspired this article. The lessons I learned from resolving these issues can be applied to just about any complicated project. You may even find them useful in an office setting, for project management. So before you take on something new, especially if you're creating something you've never built before, here are some things you need to take into consideration.
1) Do your research. Do you have all the information you need to complete your project? Do you have enough materials? Do you have the right tools? Do you have all of the other resources you need? Don't forget to count time as a resource! Not having good answers for these questions can lead to delays and other problems with your project.
2) Have a plan. Once you know what is available to you, you need to put a plan together that will help you make the best use of your resources. You should consider not only your strengths, but your weaknesses, and be prepared to come up with workarounds.
In my case, while I'd crocheted in fine thread before, it had been a long time ago. I knew I couldn't just pick up a size 14 crochet hook and start crocheting with size 80 thread right away, so I decided I'd work my way down in size. I'd work samples of the two patterns in three sizes: ordinary yarn, size 3 thread, and size 80 tatting thread. This would both retrain me to work with fine thread, and get the patterns into my fingers so I could work them without even looking at the instructions (the point of the trip was to look at canyons after all). I brought all of my hooks with me on the trip, along with the appropriate materials, so I could choose whichever hook would work best. Fortunately I didn’t have a problem with airport security. If you bring yarns and a project which has been partially started the security folk are less likely to think your crochet needles are terrorist weapons. But just in case I had a self-addressed stamped envelope ready to mail my hooks home if security wouldn’t let me bring them on the plane.
3) Materials matter. Sometimes you need the best materials you can find; other times, you can make do with what you have on hand; still other times, you can scavenge or re-purpose. It all depends on what you're trying to accomplish. Some materials are easier to work with or have different tolerances than others.
I struggled to work with the intermediate-sized thread I'd brought with me on the trip. It turned out to have more twist built into it than any thread I'd worked with before. Later, when I found I had to get more supplies, I picked up some crochet cotton with a nice hand and apparently less of a twist. It was a pleasure to work with, and I could get the same amount of crocheting done far more quickly.
4) Get more material than you think you will need, but not too much. Especially if you're creating something new, it's hard to estimate how much material you will need. You want to make sure you have what you need, and a little more, so that you're not tempted to cut corners. On the other hand, having too much can lead to wastefulness, and may also be expensive; it's a matter of balancing your resources appropriately.
I'd never done a project quite like this before, and I was packing in haste for my trip. As a result, I packed enough yarn and thread to finish one lace sample in each size, but not two. I ended up having to buy more supplies, and hoping I didn't get so much that it wouldn't fit in my luggage for the flight back home. Fortunately, yarn and thread are inexpensive; this could really bite you if you're dealing with expensive materials. As a general rule of thumb, assume you'll throw one sample away.
5) Tools matter. To some extent, what I said about materials also applies to tools. You want to get a tool that's suitable for your purposes. You may not need a brand-new thingamajig; at the same time, you don't want to get one so old that it breaks apart when you try to use it. It also needs to be the right size for your purpose.
Which leads to the problem that I ran into. A size 14 crochet hook is a tiny thing, but believe it or not, it's actually too big to work with size 80 tatting thread. When I looked into the issue online (this goes back to my first point about doing your research), I discovered that I needed a size 15 or 16 hook. I knew that you couldn't just walk into the craft section of a Wal-Mart and get a hook that small. They're the smallest hooks you can get commercially. I found a source online, and received my hooks in the mail shortly after I got back.
I wish I could say that this completely solved my problem, but it didn't, as I'll explain later.
6) Understand the jargon and terms used. This point goes back to doing your research. A word or phrase may seem to mean one thing, but when used in a technical manner, it takes on a whole new meaning. While you'll find this a lot in technology-related fields, it can crop up anywhere – yes, even in crafts.
Remember the original publication dates I mentioned for the lace patterns? It turns out that terms for crochet stitches have not only evolved over the years, they're now different depending on the country you're in! A stitch we call “single crochet” in the US is referred to as “double crochet” in the UK. America and England – two countries separated by a common language. But before a certain date, US publications used the UK terms. Regardless, these are two very different stitches, which meant I wouldn't get the right result if I assumed the wrong terms.
7) Make samples (or prototypes) and learn from them. The IT industry knows this. In fact, a prototype will go through several distinct stages (i.e. “proof of concept”) before it ever leaves the research and development department. By making a prototype, you'll learn how long something takes to make, what supplies it requires, what techniques will work when putting it together, whether it will come out the right size, and so forth.
In crochet, most patterns start by telling you the gauge, or how many of the main stitches used in the pattern equals an inch, and usually how many rows of that stitch equals an inch. Everyone crochets with a different amount of tension, so it's not unusual to require a hook that is one or two sizes smaller or larger than the pattern indicates to get the desired result. That wasn't an issue with me, so much as using the prototypes to actually learn the pattern and what the finished product was supposed to look like. But that's the beauty of prototypes; you can learn many things from them. In fact, the next few points I learned explicitly from working the prototypes.
8) Smaller projects have tighter assembly tolerances. If you're making something, being off by an eighth of an inch isn't a big deal – unless you're already dealing with something as small as a quarter-inch seam allowance.
In my case, I had no problem crocheting the yarn samples, and even the size 3 thread samples went smoothly once I switched to the better materials. Working with the smallest size hook and thread in the car, however, proved to be nearly impossible. Every bump shook my hand and threw me off my stitching.
9) It will always take more time than you think it will. My editor tells me that this truism is known as Hofstrader's Law – and that it's true even when you remember to take Hofstrader's Law into consideration! It's not unusual to be optimistic in your planning. After all, you're justifiably confident about the skills and resources you can bring to bear on your project, right?
Crafters who have mostly crocheted in yarn may be surprised by how long it takes to create even a small piece of lace. If you made those stitches in yarn, the project would go faster, and it would be much larger. But you're working with a smaller hook and finer thread, and you're making the same number of stitches, and a stitch takes the same amount of time to make whether you're doing it in yarn or thread. In fact, it might even take more time to make with the finer thread, because you're using a smaller hook, and you need to be more precise – see what I said above about small projects having fewer tolerances for error.
10) Don't lose sight of the forest for the trees. When you made your plan for the project, you probably organized it in a step-by-step fashion. That's only half of the job. You also need to know why you're taking each step. What purpose does it serve? This way, if you run into a snag at a particular point, you can step back and see if doing something else will work as well or better. You may also avoid getting so caught up in the details that you lose sight of what you're really trying to do.
At one point in my project, I started making a really large sample in the intermediate size. I wanted to show all the features of the lace. I got about a third of the way through before I reminded myself of why I was making the samples in the first place – to get the pattern into my fingers so I could create a “creditable version” in the smallest size. I stopped right then, realizing I'd learned what I needed to know from that sample and was wasting time by continuing to work on the sample.
11) Be open to re-purposing or using old things in new ways. Some of the coolest projects around are made from recycled materials. The purse, skirt or shorts made from an old pair of denim jeans is the most obvious example, but there are plenty of others. And sometimes you need to be prepared to adapt your tools or supplies.
Here I need to get a little technical. Have you ever looked closely at a crochet hook? Once you get past the hook, the shaft turns into an elongated cone, followed by a cylinder. That cylinder, of course, is of a constant diameter. When you make a stitch, you pull the thread over this cylinder, and then pull the hook through, to give you a constant gauge. Unfortunately, I ran into a problem with the smallest hooks: for whatever reason, that cylinder was so large that I couldn't make my stitches nearly as tight as I wanted. I tried to not pull my stitches all the way to the cylinder, but this meant that I couldn't achieve a consistent gauge.
I needed to do a relatively trivial bit of re-purposing. To get a consistent gauge, I'd have to stop the thread at the same point on the hook – somewhere along the cone. So how could I do that? I really didn't want to mark up my brand-new hooks, and even if I did, I wasn't sure I'd be able to hit the mark exactly every time. A friend came to my rescue – he told me about painter’s tape, which would go around the hook and leave no mark once it was removed. It’s similar to masking tape but leaves no residue. I could put the tape on thick enough to stop the thread. Problem solved.
12) Be prepared to revise your plan. We all know that things don't always turn out the way we expect them to: the resources we want may not be available, the ones we get may cause unforeseen problems, something comes up that changes everything. If we're not flexible enough to roll with the punches and find solutions to these problems, all we'll get is frustrated.
My samples were taking so long that I decided I'd finish one “creditable” lace pattern, not both (though I might yet try to do the other one later). But I've resolved to really do it right. I've been a subscriber to PieceWork almost since the first issue; I own every back issue, and I've read most of them. Many times I've seen articles where a complicated technique or motif is used in a separate project for readers to make – part of an intricate pattern from a rich embroidery may be used as part of a pincushion, for example. So I'm going to do the lace pattern I chose in three different ways: as a shawl (with yarn), a necklace (size 3 thread), and a handflower (size 80 tatting thread). If I'm feeling more ambitious I may even make it as written.
These twelve rules have helped me take this project, which I initially thought was going to be simple, and make it manageable. The same dozen rules could also apply to other crafts and hobbies, and even major industrial projects. There’s a light at the end of the tunnel and I’m going to be able make a really decent finished project.
Links
Recommondations for air travel with crochet hooks and knitting needles.
Transportation Security Administration webpage on traveling with crafting tools.
PieceWork magazine's May-June 2009 issue including the antique crochet challenge.
About the author
Terri Wells has been a crafter for most of her life and a writer for almost as long.
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