I’ve been making some more lacemaking tools. I had a piece of Beenatree that looked to have a nice close grain and wasn’t too heavy so I decided to try a new style of Pin Vice. These ones have a longer handle, more like the barrel of a chubby pen. These will be ideal for someone who like to use a pencil grip when pricking patterns. You can find more details on the shop page……
{ 0 comments }
One of the most important issues in my business of creating lacemaking bobbins is the challenge of maintaining a keen edge on my turning tools. To that end I have indulged in some retail therapy and invested in the Jig Adaptor Table to fit my Robert Sorby Pro Edge sharpening system.
I have yet to set it up but have high hopes of improving the quality of my tools and in turn (pardon the pun) the quality of the finish I obtain from the tools.
I’ll post a review of the jig and how it’s improving the lacemaking bobbins when I get it installed and working in the next few days.
{ 0 comments }
The woods used for lacemaking bobbins are many and varied, and each lends its own character to the finished article. All Turners have our favourites and tend to pick that type of wood first when we go in the workshop to get ’your eye in’. The pile of wood blanks can be a bit like a jar of sweets, you don’t know which one to pick, so you pick your favourite because it’s fairly safe.
Buying wood is even more like a trip to the sweet shop, especially when you spot a bargain – we all like those! Just occasionally at Lace Days we come across them if a Bobbin Maker is retiring and parting with surplus stock of blanks, often just in a box with no labels, so you have no idea of what the wood is. Some, like purple heart wood and ebony are easily identifiable – but an awful lot are not and fall in to one of two categories, Wasawood or Beenatree 
The downside is that you have no idea how it’s going to behave on the lathe. The upside is some are an absolute joy and produce beautiful lacemaking bobbins and tools. When that happens I promote them from the ranks of Beenatree to ‘Random Wood’. Sometimes I can make a shrewd guess, but as you can rarely be sure, Random Wood it remains.
Taking the plunge and buying a Random Wood lacemaking bobbin or tool is a bit like a lucky dip, you will always get a good prize and you might end up with something that ages to spectacular beauty as the wood matures fully.
{ 0 comments }
“It’s not a Shed, it’s a Workshop”, so says flaminglacer, my other half. True, when she bought it for me as a place to turn my lacemaking bobbins, we paid extra for a stronger floor, bigger doorway and higher roof than the standard shed specification. Somehow though, shed still rolls off the tongue more easily than workshop. Perhaps ‘workshop’ is a state of mind, and as I get to spend more time there it will take on that mantle.
In an ideal world the shed would only hold my workbench, lathe and tools for turning the lacemaking bobbins and tools that I make, along with storage for some of the wood and other materials I use. For the time being it also has to store much of general gardening paraphernalia since we lost our smaller shed to old age. My plan for later in the year is to replace that, and give myself space for a few home comforts in ‘my’ shed, then I will have space for a drawing table where I can work on more designs for the bobbins, tools and pin dishes as well as doing some of the fancy work required to make the multi-coloured and wired lacemaking bobbins that ‘her indoors’ likes so much.
{ 0 comments }
Lacemaking Bobbins are the pride and joy of any Lacemaker. Among the greatest pleasures in making lace are the beautiful tools we get to use. Each one is carefully hand crafted by a skilled maker and is perfectly designed for it’s purpose, but most of all we love our bobbins.
We each set up our pillows differently to suit the way we work and the type of lace we are making. Common to all of them though, is the array of Lacemaking bobbins suspended from a forest of pins and a web of thread.
Different types of lace require different types of bobbins to suit the thread and the method of making, Honiton Lace Bobbins for example are tiny with slightly pointed ends. Some of the ‘Continental’ Bobbins have heavy wooden bulbs but the prettiest of all lacemaking bobbins are those bedecked with ‘spangles’, the lovely beads that look like a scattering of jewels across the pillow.
Producing practical lacemaking bobbins is a skill that few wood turners possess, and finding good bobbins is like winning a treasure hunt. I was delighted when my husband, Peter, learned to turn bobbins under the guidance of David Springett and Stuart Johnson, two of the finest [click to continue…]
{ 0 comments }
