Cattern Lace

I was lucky enough to get a second weekend at Alston Hall last October making Honiton lace with Pat Perryman. I finished my heart and was very pleased with the fillings, but my perls and sewing ins were a disaster! I’m posting pictures to shame myself.

Gah, what a mess.

So when I got back I spent a lot of time practising and decided to do another heart, with different fillings and better perls. I haven’t been working on it consistently since then BTW, and I actually finished it more than a month ago but it’s just taken a while to post about it. Anyhow, this is a (poor quality) in-progress shot- those perls were feeling much more stable and the sewings-in whilst not quite a dream were definitely less messy.

And here are some close ups of the fillings- blossom at the top and brick at the bottom.

The previous version had four pin filling at the top and whole-stitch block at the bottom:

Take your eyes off those dreadful perls and focus on the fillings…

They look quite similar from a distance but are all very different. It always amazes me the number of distinct patterns and effects you can get by just a different combination of twists or crosses.

The two together- bad perls on the left- booo.

So I now have four Honiton fillings under my belt and can do acceptable looking perls. Yay, me! Having made lace since I was a child it’s nice to be learning something new.

I’ve had this frame for a while and the heart fits into it perfectly.

Main learning points? I need to make sure I’m pulling up properly as some of those sewings-in and stitches are still a little loose <sigh>.

Finally though, a piece of Honiton I can be proud of. I’m thinking of doing a sampler next to practice some more fillings but there are a few other things on the go which I’d like to get finished first so it may take a while.