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Helmdon Trail - Lace Making

 
The old skill of lace making
The old skill of lace making
Lace making first appeared in the East Midlands in the late 1500s, but we do not know the number of Helmdon villagers involved in the craft until the 1841 census at which date the number was very small. However, in 1861 around a quarter of the women were registered as lacemakers, supplementing, no doubt, the low farm wages of village men. Lace making was a cottage industry. The work was drudgery, and the long hours spent over lace work in often very poor light undermined health. Village lace school taught the craft, and there were two in Helmdon. In England as a whole lace making began to decline in the 1880s, mainly because of the advent of machine-made lace, and in the village in 1861 only six women made lace for a living. Today the craft survives in Helmdon as a leisure activity only, as it does everywhere else.

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