Lace Design, Part I: Inspiration

Margene mentioned in her post Today that she wondered what my muse might have been when designing the Hidcote Garden Shawl, and since I’ve been meaning to post something about how I design… the inspiration, the process, the production. To keep from loosing your interest, I’ll break it up into parts.

The Inspiration

Russian Sage

For me, inspiration comes from a lot of varied places. Hidcote actually came in a dream (technically that state right on the edge of waking when you’re not sure if consciousness has kicked in or if you’re still technically asleep. That moment is very short for me… when I’m up I’m up). But I woke having had this vision in my head of the different textures of an architecturally beautiful English garden. The prolific flower beds, and the tiled and cobbled walkways; brick planting beds with benches around the edges to sit on… pools and fountains in hidden places. Also specifically, Russian Sage (pictured above) which always reminds me of big fields of lavendar. I love how established beds of lavendar spill out over the stone like waterfalls. I really liked the pleasing way that the various textures in a garden interact. How even though there are a million things going on in a garden like that, you can still feel peaceful and serene. I wanted to evoke that in a shawl.

For Icarus, I was just really tired of shawls with patterning all over. I had just come through 3 back to back Adamas Shawls and wanted to break up the monotony. As a side story, I was working in Special Collections and Archives of the Library at USU and came across Sophia Caulfield’s Dictionary of Needlework while cataloging old books. I spent HOURS reading it, but couldn’t take it home or use it in any way. I got permission to make some photo copies, but was later delighted when we discovered that it had been reprinted in two volumes! I checked out the versions in the library until I could afford my own copies from Amazon.com. This is one of my very favorite knitting books! Anyway…. I found the feathery pattern in that book. From their illustration it reminded me of the finials on Gothic cathedrals! It was interesting and structural and I fell in love with it.

Sometimes I’m inspired by a stitch pattern. Barbara Walker’s Treasuries (I only have the first and second so far) are a great place to start. Adamas began from a Walker Treasury, as did Seraphim. I was flipping through them for inspiration and found that I really liked one stitch pattern, and then ran with it.

Some of my inspiration comes from very unlikely places. The Woven Cable Scarf and Wrap for instance came when I was watching a movie. In the movie (I can’t even remember which one it is…. the scene has the mother, who is a member of the royal family, coming out to check on her 2 blond sons who are talking to a psychotic gardener or something) the mother is wearing this cabled ruana, but it looked like different cable pattens all slapped together with no rhyme or reason. It bothered me so much I started designing a better cabled wrap in my head. Where the cables flowed organically into and out of each other and didn’t look so PASTED on to a garment.

Apple Blossoms

A lot of the time I’m inspired by textural details (that’s why I like architecture so much) and the interaction of positive and negative space that makes lace what it is. If you stare long enough up at the bare branches of a tree (especially during sunset), you start to forget which is the positive and which is the negative space. The sky begins to feel like the colored glass in a window and the branches like the lead. I love that with lace each is equally important.

Stay tuned for how I like to manipulate that space in Part II

M

Click here to read Part II: The Process of Design
Click here to read Part III: The Production

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