Another of the little treasures that appear from time to time on the antique market stalls – this one bears the rust marks of pin or staple and the pencilled number 9 and other pattern markings clearly visible. I’m not going to try to wash these things out – previous experience with a similar blue marking in and around the monograms on some old serviettes I recently bought showed it to be quite inert to bleach, and it isn’t sooo obvious when the fabric is dry.

On fine handkerchief linen, the fillings seem to me to be either counted ( needing 12 year old eyes) or very accurate eyeballed sense of even spacing, for the patterns all depend on that. I have always been admirer of the various counted thread works, and among my books in Australia are numerous ones with patterns like this – I went through quite a phase, but on larger count fabrics and smaller objects like book marks, or tray cloths with one edge or a central motif…

One of my favourite books since I bought it in about 1979 is “Needlelace and Needleweaving” by Jilly Nordfors. A modern embroidery classic, of course it’s far away, on the shelves in Aus, just when I would really like to be dipping into it for inspiration – wonderful photography – but instead I am mentally going over how I used it for inspiration in the 1980’s creative embroidery. But perhaps it is better that I draw on my memory and experience without it, and I feel sure some of it is going to be appearing again in some way in the leather lace theme that is developing just now – so, I realise I am already under the influence of what has gone before; and pleased being able to see things in a different but related way. A quilting friend commented the other day on my new work, saying how naturally it seemed to follow on what has been my inspiration with the fine details of landscape.
The geologists around me are commenting that the little stemmed french knots coming out of the lacy holes in the leather are looking very dendritic in character. (little lace-like intrusions often black (due to managanese) sometimes even gold, in tiny cracks in rocks….. no doubt about how one’s background of knowledge influences the interpetation of what you are seeing with your eyes.