Back in May 1999, Professor Ralph E Griswold began a project to create a home for scanned documents relating to weaving, including lacemaking.  This came about due to his retirement.  He started to research the mathematical aspects of weaving and through this the on-line database was launched. 

Professor Griswold was part of the computing team at the University of Arizona.  The on-line Digital Archive was housed on the UAZ servers.

The first document added was Cyrus Uhler's Draught and Cording, made from scans done at Lebanon Valley College Library. The first document scanned locally was de Lantsheere's Trésor de L'Art Dentellier from a dilapidated original purchased at a sale at the University of Arizona Library.

The key requirement was for the material to be either out of copyright or for the author to have given permission for the work to be added.

As of today, there are over 9k pdfs available, including 4.7k articles and 9.1k pdf documents, of which over 470 are books that you can download.

The lace world came to know of this project and help with it through the work of Tess Palmer on the Arachne mail lists. 

Tess began her partnership with the Professor as a willing partner to scan lace documents and a great partnership began.

She would keep us informed on how the work was going, seek out contributors and put translators in touch with the Professor.   Over the next few years, we became used to seeing emails about Tess & the Professor in our feeds telling us about new uploads and searches for out of copyright material to be added.

As lacemaking became a major focus in the archive, it was promoted to it's own section.

In order to make choosing a document to download easier, low res sample pages were added to many of the documents so you could 'try before you buy'.

These days, that seems a strange thing to do but when the archive was created, many were still on dial up so downloading a pdf could take 15 - 30 minutes and then to find out it didn't contain what you were looking for was a shock.

Sadly, Professor Griswold passed away on 4th October, 2006.  His pioneering work in computer science reached out far further than Arizona.  His impact for lacemakers through the archive has been a wonderful memorial to this great man.

Why not try out the book blog for some inspiration.  I've even added in a wedding category.  Just click on the button below.

Think of it as the difference between trying to read a newspaper in another language and having to use either a dictionary or google translate compared to being fluent in that language.

One of the key things that, as a teacher, I have experienced, is that it gives false confidence.  I have had people come to me who have made an intermediate piece that came with instructions and now want to try a similar piece that has none and it is a real shock that they have no understanding on how to make the lace.

I will break down the techniques in the pattern they want to make and together we will choose 3 or 4 pieces that will them them the knowledge and confidence to attempt the piece they want to make.  I will never tell a student that they can't make a piece, I will always show them how to gain the skills to make it.

So why are these patterns without instructions 'so expensive'?
That is an easy answer. 
You are relating cost to the number of pages that you get. 

​Whereas, for most designers, the price reflects the time and knowledge it took to create the design.

So, what should I get when I buy a pattern?
Simple answer - the pattern.  Anything else is a bonus.

• 2021 wage = 300% 1988 wage
• 2021 bobbin = 160% cost of 1988 bobbin
• 2021 pillow = 220% cost of a 1988 pillow

Even allowing for food and bills, the cost of lace equipment has not risen at the same rate as other things.  It has become more affordable.

Often booklets or self published books were limited print runs.  But, if no one wants the book then just because a book was a limited run, doesn't make it worth a vast amount of money.

In the book blog, I've annotated each entry as to whether or not it's still in print.  If you can't find the book that you are looking for then remember, it's a work in progress.  Fill out my contact form with details of the book and if I have it in the library I'll push the entry to the top of the list for you.

Some books though, remain very highly priced regardless of trends.

If the book has prickings in it on a separate sheet, always confirm whether or not that sheet is included.  Nothing worse than buying a book to find out you can't make the patterns because they are missing.

You can tell that a pin has steel in it because it can be picked up by a magnet (that is the iron that the magnet is reacting to).

Our hands, the air, even straw or sawdust pillows naturally have moisture in them.  For short periods of time, a few weeks or so, the pins will be fine in the pillow.  However, the issue starts when the pins are left in the pillow for extended periods of time.

The first indication will be that the pins don't want to come out of the pillow easily, then you start to see spots on the pins finally, spotting on the lace.

Want to know about pins?
If you are in the UK, then plan a visit to the Forge Needle Museum or read about pins at Brian Lemin's website

So far, so good?

Not really, because when I learnt, cloth and whole stitch were interchangable as terms and Cloth Stich & Twist was described as Cloth Stitch & Twist or Whole Stitch and Twist.

Now, there were a number of reasons that the International System didn't take off and the main one was limitations on printing.  

During the resurgence of lacemaking in the 70s and 80s, colour printing was exceptionally expensive.  Most designers would only have a colour cover and maybe one or two colour plates in their books.  This wasn't an issue for looking at the lace patterns and finished articles because most, if not all the lace was made in the traditional white or black and the prickings were black dots.  

Around the mid 90s, dual colour because easier to do so we started to see the addition of blue into the printing of a number of books, most noticably Pamela Nottingham's later books.  This was followed by tri colour printing and we started to see red included in Geraldine Stott's and Bridget Cook's later books.

​With the opening of the EuroTunnel in 1990, it now became easy for lacemakers in the UK to take a train to Belgium and holiday in Bruges, giving access to the Kant Centrum and attend OIDFA events in Europe.

Towards the end of the 90s, access to international books was also becoming much easier in the UK due to international lace suppliers attending events like the National Lacemaker's Fair at the NEC and teaching at summer schools.

Interest in books from outside the UK grew and UK lace suppliers found it easier to obtain books from publishers such as Barbara Vey.  

It was around this time that multicoloured printing took off and we started to see the International Colour Code being used more and more in books and people started to realise that terminology isn't global.  So, the use of C and T became the international language on many of the newsgroups such as Arachne so that lacemakers could talk to each other and understand what was being discussed.

In the past, I have had people borrow a book and not return it.  So, I now simply say no.  Many of my books are out of print and irreplaceable.  I use them as a resource for my students to look through and loosing such books would impact them as much as me.

So, what about just copying a pattern from one of my books or single patterns?

​The answer is still no.

But I just want a copy of one pattern
​Doesn't matter.  If it's covered by copyright then making a copy and giving it you breaks copyright.  You are stealing the intellectual property of the person who designed it.

But you can copy up to 10% without breaking copyright
No you can't.  That is a common quote that people say that has no basis in copyright law.  If copying is permitted, it is stated in the UK and US for example as 'fair usage' which is commonly taken to mean no more than 10% but I fact this refers to quoting a book in academic work.

But you are allowed to copy the patterns from a book to make them yourself, why can't you make a copy for me?
The designer grants the book owner permission to copy the patterns for personal use, so that you can make the lace.  It would be rather difficult to buy a book of patterns and not be able to copy them and make prickings.

What the designer did not give permission for, is for you or me to copy the patterns and give them away to other people.

I'm not charging anyone for the copy so that's ok then?
No it's not.  Paying or not, it doesn't matter.  You are prohibited from passing on copies.  Just because you don't profit from the copy doesn't make it ok.  You are still effectively stealing someone else's intellectual property by passing on unlawful copies

I can't get the pattern I want, but I've got a great photograph of it so I'll just make my own pattern by working the photo or creating my own pricking and it will then be my pricking.
​You can and you can't.

Working from the design to learn the pattern .. That's ok, you are allowed to do that under educational purposes, however you cannot share the pattern you have created or sell the lace you have made because they are covered by the copyright of the original pattern.  The pattern and the images of that pattern are covered by copyright.  You can't just go and nick someone else's work.  It is stealing!

If I change 10% of the pattern, then I'm not breaking copyright and it's now my new pattern
That would be a nope, nope, nope.  This 10% thing is terrible and keeps being rolled out.  There is nothing that says changing a bit revokes copyright.