SOMETIMES A SMALL PROJECT EXPLODES

Did you ever have a small project that you think you can make it or fix it in a just a couple hours? Yeah, that.

Because I realized I didn’t have time to make a new skirt in the four days before I was attending an afternoon tea with friends in costume, dressed in the early 1900s, I went to Plan B and pulled items from my closet that I could wear instead. I picked a black and white pin dot skirt; with a white cotton voile shirtwaist I had sewn lace appliques on the front. I remembered an antique Edwardian black tape lace jacket that was gifted to me last year by a friend in the Port Townsend (WA) Heritage Association who was clearing out her collection. (I’m calling this tape lace but it may not be the correct term. If anyone knows, please let me know.)

 

While I was trying the jacket on, I noticed quite a bit of the lace had separated in parts where the threads had rotted, so I decided to do some repairs on it to strengthen it before wearing it and causing more damage. The “lace” itself is pretty strong although a bit dry. The center front also seemed to want to close there so I pulled an antique black glass button from my stash and sewed that to it. If you notice just up to the right of the button is an area of netting that are is in certain areas of the jacket. Some of it I can’t save so I’m attaching the lace portions together to stabilize it.

I started yesterday afternoon tying a double thread of heavy-duty thread between the separated pieces. There were a lot of loose threads hanging from it and I thought maybe someone before me had tried to do the same thing but didn’t clip those loose ends. And then there were single threads just barely holding some parts together with the thread stretched across in open air. What the heck? Ok, maybe it was a way to keep the lace front separating? There were some areas that looked like it had braided thread between the lace.

 

After spending four hours slowly going over and over the jacket, I had to take a break because black thread on black lace is an eye strain. So I started up again today and I’m almost done after four more hours of repairing. But after handling this so much, I now think those single loose threads were originally that braided thread that held the lace together and came unraveled, and those loose threads are broken dried up ones. So there’s going to be more work continuing later.

                                       This is a photo of a similar jacket dated 1908-1914.

I've added a photo of me wearing my complete outfit at tea a couple days later.