Flora Klickmann - Domestic Doyenne and Queen of the Needle

Amongst my burgeoning collection of vintage knitting, crochet and needlework books are three treasured volumes by Flora Klickmann. I had never heard of her before purchasing one of her books on ebay recently, but her books are wonderful for anybody interested in vintage linens and how they were made.

Wikipedia gave me the following information about her.
She was an English writer, journalist and editor, for many years editor of "The Girl's Own and Woman's Magazine".

 She also published popular novels for women and girls, such as the "Flower Patch" books. She edited many books on needlework published between 1900 and 1920.

The first book I purchased was this little gem, "The Little Girl's Sewing Book":

This delightful little book was published in 1915, and as the title suggests, it is an introduction to sewing aimed at small girls. It is full of simple instructions for gifts and dolls' clothes. Many of today's adults would be challenged by skills which even small girls were expected to have in Edwardian times.

As a bonus, it features beautiful pen and ink illustrations, although the illustrator is given no credit, probably an artist doing hackwork for the magazine.





As well as instructions and patterns there is also plenty of covert moralising going on in this book, as was the custom in those days. Klickmann included  little poems she wrote for the edification of her readers:

Here are some of the adorable dolls' clothes she gives instructions for:

And their owner

This book has been republished and there are quite a few copies for sale on ebay international, though I have yet to see another original edition.









This book got me interested in Klickmann and I started searching for her other books. As well as her novels, I have found a few other original editions of her needlework books. So far, I have acquired "The Home Art Book Of Fancy Stitchery" and "The Modern Crochet Book".

You have to love the Victorians and the Edwardians for their ability to create an interminable subtitle.

If you ever wondered what to do with all those old hankies now that you use tissues, here are some ideas:

I was awestruck by the suggestions for chemise trims. Much of this lace would have been made by gaslight or candlelight. My eyes struggle with the brightest electric light, and that's just for knitting! It's also amazing for us today to think of the time and effort that people put into making everyday items beautiful. Today, we buy it machine made and throw it away when it needs the simplest mending (not me, I have an enormous mending pile, it's a bit like a Black Hole, items disappear into it, never to be seen again - Not quite, they do eventually surface for a new lease on life, albeit months later).

The ads in these old books are particularly entertaining and charming. Here are two of my favourites from Ardern's Crochet Cotton:

And I think that what was originally meant by a "brassiere" is not what we would mean today:

 Surely, they would not do all this beautiful fine work and then hide it on their underwear?

I also have "The Modern Crochet Book", also with an impressive subtitle:

I was pleased to find a pattern for swastika lace, or "Nazi lace" as my son calls it.

I have some old lace featuring this motif, but since the Nazis perverted the symbol it's hard to know how to market it these days. However, it seems to have been a popular design in its day.

Clearly, I have the lace upside down in the photo because the swastika is rotating in the opposite direction from the pattern above.

This crochet incorporates fancy braid. I've often wondered how such pieces were made. I think you would find it very tricky to find such braid these days, even if you had eyesight good enough to attempt this.

And finally, a divine petticoat trim. I wish I could see the finished garment.

In this book is an ad for another Flora Klickmann book which I would love to have. If I ever have to train a servant it will be invaluable to me:

While writing this article, I remembered that for several months I have had another of Flora Klickmann's books in my watch list on ebay, and writing this has inspired me to spend the money and buy it. I eagerly await the arrival of  "Beautiful Crochet on Household Linen". I hope I haven't inspired you all to start bidding against me for future Flora Klickmann books!

Steamy Edition of Vogue - 1939

On Sunday I bought "Vogue's 15th Knitting Book" at a local vintage market for $2.00. A quick flick through the book told me it was from the 1930s so I quickly snapped it up. It was only when I got home that I realised that most of the pages in the book were well and truly stuck together.
Time to try steaming them apart. I know the theory, but I'd never actually tried it. I boiled a saucepan of water and gave it a go.

Separating the cover from the first page was the most difficult and took about half an hour. There was a fair bit of damage to the inside cover and some tearing. I'm not sure what made this book stick together, but I suspect dampness as there was no sign of food or drink.

As more pages came free I saw that the models had 1940s hair dos, so I though maybe the book was very early 40s. I just love this ad:

 

Those braided evening coats are well left behind in 1939 if you ask me.

The original owner of the book had filed lots of newspaper clippings on various topics inside the pages of the knitting book. The stuck together pages formed little envelopes which, on being steamed open, released their little treasures. I had quite a collection of these by the time I finished steaming the book. Some were from the 50s, but some bore the partial date: "193..." Aha, I thought, 1939! It all makes sense. What was special about these articles? There were two articles from 1939 about a bread price cutting war and the union campaign involved, a few celebrity photos from the 40s and 50s, a society wedding snap and two clippings from a religious publication, one showing a nativity scene and the other the Saint Ann's Mission Church. I can't see why anyone would want to keep any of them. I guess it is just a cross section of a woman's interests, and gives us a glimpse of her personality.

During the many hours I have spent trawling Pinterest and putting together my fashion decades boards I have noticed that the very end of a decade heralds the following decade. Likewise, the early years of a decade echo the second half of the previous decade. Here, in Vogue in 1939, we had distinctively 1930s patterns, with the new wartime hairdos, the "Victory Roll", and echoes of the fashions to come in the early 40s.

As I stood there for an hour bringing this book back to life, strange thoughts filled my head. What were these newspaper articles and why had they been kept? 1939, the war. Was there something special about these articles, and had they been deliberately sealed up and hidden inside this book? Spies!! I looked for a secret code. My over active imagination ran away with me. The other thought I had was, what a lot of steam, and what a shame I hadn't put the Christmas pudding into the pot before I began. The ingredients were still staring at me from the bench top making me feel guilty.

My 1939 theory was confirmed when I found this ad:

 

Note at the very top underneath the heading "Darnley's London 1912 - 1939" .

Here are some fabulous turbans:

This gorgeous little evening jacket features knitted smocking.

When I finished I came to the conclusion that this book takes the award for best photos inside the most uninteresting cover.

 

That, and the fact that the pages were stuck together and difficult to see explains why I was able to purchase the book so cheaply. I have not been able to find another copy of this book on the internet. The oldest editions of Vogue knitting books I could find came from the early 50s.

The book is in fairly good condition now, except for a little invisible tape repairing the tears on the inside of the cover. I have committed the collector's sin of repairing the spine of the cover  with invisible tape (on the inside, of course). I have too much OCD to tolerate the tatty when I can easily have the neat. It looks beautiful now. Thank goodness it was stuck together and full of secrets wonderful and ordinary, just waiting for me to come along and discover it.

Sorry, Not For Sale!

I thought I'd share with you some of my best finds. These are the really special things that I decide to keep, so sorry to vintage lace lovers out there.
I recently learned that both of my adult daughters share my love of vintage lace doilies and other linen, so these are the heirloom items I will pass on to them one day. Funny that I never realised that I'd passed on my interest. It took my eldest daughter's prospective mother-in-law to fill me in on that.

Here is a very special piece which I have had for years. The person who gave it to me told me that it came from Government House in Melbourne. It would be 19th century work.

19th Century Silk Doiley

This gorgeous doiley is extremely fine work made of silk. I think it is handmade bobbin lace. It's pale beige.
It has sat on a sideboard or an occasional table at Government House and seen a succession of Kings, Queens and Princes entertained in right regal style. Definitely Governors, probably Prime Ministers and Premiers. If only these items could talk, they would tell some interesting tales... on second thoughts, they would probably be terrible gossips.




In January I visited a lot of op shops in country Victoria and New South Wales and found a few treasures. I won't call them bargains, because I paid through the nose for them. But they were so beautiful I couldn't resist.
This is a superb large doiley in Irish crochet, where the little flowers are three dimensional. It is hand done in extremely fine ecru cotton. I bought this and the collection about to be described at the Vinnies (St Vincent de Paul) shop in Benalla, in rural central Victoria. It looks as though they have all come from the one source.

 

I would guess that these doilies once belonged in one of the stately historic homes in this area.

Tatting

When I found this pile of handmade antique tatted doilies, (in the same Vinnies store) I had to have all of them. Many of these were stained, and quite a few were a very dark ecru, actually tan.

I can barely see the threads, so I can't imagine anyone actually sitting and making these by hand with the little tatting shuttle. If you don't know what tatting is, it's done with a tiny shuttle of cotton, which you pass in and out, like a complicated and permanent cat's cradle (that doesn't pull undone). The result is a series of tiny knots around a central thread, with loops for decoration. Many years ago, (when I had leisure time, before I had babies) I learned to tat. I couldn't be bothered keeping it up, such a lot of knots and joins, and if you make a mistake, you can't pull it undone, you have to cut it off and rejoin a new piece and start that bit all over again. And you have to try to darn in about 700 ends! I suppose it's because I've done it that I can appreciate the workmanship in these doilies.

I bought 10 medium sized and four matching small doilies. I'll keep some and divide the rest between my girls.

 

When I bought these doilies, as I said before, some of them were an unusually dark brown for linen. I recently read in an old magazine, some tips for cleaning lace, where they recommend soaking the stained article in cold tea. I think this must be what happened to these doilies. I could see that they had marks, and I think the laundress had tried to disguise them by recolouring the linen. However, I popped them in the laundry soaker overnight, and they come out a lovely pale ecru, with no sign of marks. Isn't Napi-san wonderful?

 

With this pile of Vinnies doilies, I also bought two of these lovely lace pieces. I don't know how they were made. Please comment and tell me if you think you know. These had also had the tea-soak treatment, but are now restored. They look to me to be similar to guipure lace. I am imagining the stately home they all lived in, and whether or not it still exists, or whether it has been bull-dozed to make room for a new sub-division.

                                                                                 And this sweet little bobbin lace piece.

 

Back home again, you don't have to drive hundreds of kilometres to find treasures. Last week I found this fabulous piece in the Salvos store in Hastings. I'd say it's 1920s work, or earlier. Australiana was extremely popular then, as I've mentioned in a previous post.  http://vintageknitpatterns.blogspot.com.au/2013_01_01_archive.html

 I'll bet the lady who worked this devised the pattern herself. Otherwise, it's the kind of pattern that may have been published in the Weekly Times newspaper. I was sad to find that the Weekly Times no longer has a craft and pattern page.

I just love the little wrens, and the beautiful way the wattle has been worked, with little bobbles for the flowers. This piece now lives on top of the piano that no-one plays anymore.

I'm amused by the way that op shops sell doilies. They sell by size rather than quality, so you can often get an exquisite handmade lace piece for $1.00, yet they charge $5.00 for a large machine made, mass produced piece. But I'm not complaining!

So, these are the kinds of pieces I keep. My drawer is getting quite full, so I am putting together an inheritance pile for my girls. And I guess, I may have to sell some of it.

Australiana Crochet

This week a customer in Tasmania bought a really old pattern for a milk jug cover, featuring a map of Australia, a popular item in my shop. She also asked whether I had any similar crochet patterns featuring Australiana.

Australia Jug Cover

My grandfather lived with "another woman" for 40 years. This "other woman', or "partner" as I will henceforth refer to her, collected many old filet crochet patterns over the years, and after she died without an immediate family, my grandfather passed them on to me, as I was the "crafty" one in the family at that time. Most of these patterns were pages torn from The Weekly Times newspaper, featuring the women's page, with patterns for knitting, sewing and crochet. So, yes, I had quite a few patterns which which I felt you could call "Australiana".

A Bush Landscape

 

The Australiana patterns I have were published in The Weekly Times between 1923 and 1928. They are difficult to read. The print is tiny. The text goes all the way down one long column, then starts again at the top of the next column, unlike modern newspapers which publish their articles as segments on the page. This meant that patterns could start at the bottom of the page, then end at the top of the next long column, confusing to a modern newspaper reader. Also, the pages had been folded, and where the paper was creased it was difficult , and sometimes impossible to read the text. I had to get out my super magnifying glass to try to make out the pattern directions in the creases. Zooming in on the computer screen tended to distort the scanned image after a certain point. I included my transcription notes of the difficult spots in the pdf. sent to the customer. Some words had disappeared completely, and only an understanding of the sequence of the pattern could make them out.

The Weekly Times had been running a competition, and most of these patterns were submitted by readers who had created them themselves. In those days, you made your own , or went without. I guess there was nothing much to do in the evenings except your knitting, sewing or crochet - or you created new projects because there weren't many available to you otherwise.

 

I put together 10 of these patterns as a pdf. file and after at least 3 hours work, sold it to the customer for $5.00. She was thrilled, and shared it with her enthusiastic friends (none of whom can crochet!)Clearly, it wasn't the profit that motivated me to do this. It was the love of the old patterns, and the desire to share them with someone who appreciated them.

That is really the underlying motivation behind my vintage shop. I want these beautiful old things to go to homes where they will be loved.

Update: As from 2015 I am not selling any more digital copies of patterns due to copyright confusion.

Crochet In Fashion

http://www.etsy.com/shop/VintageKnitPatterns

Before starting my Etsy shop and my blog, I had no idea how popular crochet was these days. I thought it was only me who liked it. The most popular items in my shop have been crocheted glove patterns and crocheted cushion and pillow cases. Most of the people who favourite this glove pattern can't crochet, but wish they could!



https://www.etsy.com/listing/101194284/crocheted-gloves-1940s




This gorgeous pattern for filet crochet gloves was published in the 40s, and everyone seems to love it.  No doubt, some people have weddings in mind, too.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Jennifer Lopez in Crochet

Did you see Jennifer Lopez in her fabulous white crochet shorts and crop top earlier this year? Take a look.
http://www.oohlalablog.com/celebrity-style/2012/08/jennifer-15/

She looks wonderful in the white crochet with her enviable tan and great body. It made me wish I had the pattern for this outfit (as well as the body and the tan!) Not everyone could wear white so well, and it would be interesting to see this outfit in different colours. It made me think to look back in some of the old books from the 70s when crochet was really hip, to see if I could find anything similar. Sadly, I have not yet found a pattern for shorts - although I do have quite a few patterns for knitted knickers (scanties) from the 30s and 40s which could do in a pinch.

However, I did find these fabulous patterns which I thought I would share.

Daring, no knickers please skirt



Flower Power Crochet

Patons jumpsuit, late 70s

 Look at this gorgeous dress, I can see it being worn today. You can't see in the poor quality image, but she is also wearing white fish net stockings. Fabulous.

Woman's Day, 1968



New Idea, 1976



And here is one of my all time favourites, the sun top with optional sunhat crown. I always meant to make it and never did.

So, the gear, the cushion covers and the pillow cases are super popular. Now, bring on the doiley revival!