More laces

Textiles for a purpose

Hello! I’m going to preface this post with a small message, because every time I do a post like this, I get tens of unsubscribes. If you want to unsubscribe because of this post, please do go ahead, you will not be missed, because you have clearly misunderstood what I do, and why.

There are many, many people you can follow to look at pretty pictures of French textiles, and read shallow pretty accounts of their history. But I do what I do precisely because of who I am, because of what I have learned and seen in my half-century on this planet. Textiles, especially handmade textiles, mean everything to me. I have learnt so much through them, and they have brought me everything I value. Everything I do professionally, and much of what i do personally, revolves around textiles. Handmade textiles, and the people behind them, both living and long-departed, have taught me much of what I know is important.

So please do go ahead and unsubscribe, because I’d prefer not to sell to you, and you can remove yourself from my Instagram account whilst you are at it. Remember, anything taken with the wrong energy rebounds.

There is another reason I am writing this as a newsletter. If I put it on Instagram, it will be shadow-banned, nobody will see it, and I will spend another week trying to regain visibility on Insta. I’ve just spent the past week being a good Instagram citizen, not being too political, not mentioning Palestine, all so that the post that goes with this newsletter tomorrow when I publish it will be visible. Fascist times.

The other day I was having a conversation in my messages with a new follower, a far-cooler-than-me American woman who has been in Germany for longer than I have been in France. We were lamenting the rise of fascism which Palestine has uncovered in the West, and for some reason we got to talking about witchcraft. I am a firm believer in a sort of witchcraft, which is nothing more or less than the channeling of the energy from the natural world. To be honest, I don’t know if my beliefs about energy-channeling would really fit the definition of witchcraft as practised by a genuine pagan, but I’m not too concerned. I do believe in energy, in directing energy, in residual energy. I have mentioned many times that when working with antique textiles I sometimes get a deep intimation of the energy of the maker, sometimes enough to raise the hairs on the back of my neck. Many Indigenous societies believe that artisan makers, be they weavers or carvers or others, leave a piece of their own being in their creations. I read somewhere recently that Navajo weavers always weave in a line from the design to the edge of the rug to allow their spirit to escape after having spent such a lot time deeply engaged with their weaving. This makes sense to me. The many handmade and hand-dyed pieces I own all contain energy which I can feel when I wear them.

One of the things I fully believe about energy is that you cannot expect to receive what you are not able to give. And it is in this spirit that I am presenting my latest raffle. I run these raffles for the Mughari family in Palestine. I picked this family from the Operation Olive Branch list of registered vetted families using a random number generator, and I decided before I generated the number that whichever family I was presented with, I would see to their goal. Randomly, I was given this family, the organiser is their young adult son, the same age as my young adult daughter, so instantly I knew the energy was working.

Before I introduce the prizes for this raffle, I just want to also say this. I know you are tired of being solicited, but honestly, being solicited for a couple of euros is nothing compared to what is really going on in the world. Also, a function of Empire is to exhaust us, bore us, make us feel hopeless, and distract us with bullshit, like the current circus that is the neverending leadup to the US elections, where one genocidal candidate is replaced with another genocidal candidate to try to confront a third genocidal candidate. And if you don’t like that you can always watch Beyoncé twerk, or speculate on how much plastic surgery it takes to look like a Kardashian, or go look at a screen containing images that will make you feel poor and inferior and ugly, so that you buy something to fix those feelings.

If you cut through all of this, the distractions, the deliberate mind-numbing stupid politics, the celebrity cults, the stalling, the feelings of hopelessness, the feelings that this has gone on too long and it’s time for you to move onto the next thing, the siren songs to just forget about it and buy something to make yourself feel better - if you cut through all of that dross, what you find is solidarity, and solidarity is a magic thing. I’ve been so deeply disappointed by so many people over the past nine months, people I know personally, public figures, musicians, writers, artists, politicians. But I have come across a number of people who, without even knowing them personally, I would entrust my children’s lives to. Why? Because of the intense and never-waivering solidarity they are showing. Some people are showing that they are both faithful and staunch, and I love those people, whether private individuals or public figures.

So now I am asking you to continue to be this with me, here, if you can. We have raised around €6000 in the past two months, which I think is an absolutely phenomenal effort on our collective behalfs, and from my side I will keep going until we hit the goal of €20,000. This is all the more urgent because one of Abdulla’s hopes was to rebuild his family house, but just under two weeks ago, the IDF moved back into central Gaza, pushing Abdalla and his family out once again. And when the IDF left, they mined Abdalla’s family house and blew it up. The family now have nothing left.

From the safety of my little crumbly house that I finally managed to buy late last year after years of seven-day work-weeks, I cried a lot when I heard this. It isn’t fair. None of this is fair. We can try our best to make it less unfair whenever we can.

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On offer this time are two pieces of linen thread bobbin lace, from the amazing haul I wrote about in my last newsletter (by the way the video link in the last newsletter was not added, and then the update newsletter I sent out with the link had an error….grrrrr…I am so sorry - the link is here. And I will test it before it goes out this time!). Please go see that newsletter if you didn’t read it, because these laces are incredible. There are a few for sale on my website and I will put more up in the coming days.

I’ve selected two beautiful examples - the first is a reasonably fine piece of lace which would have been used to trim clothing. This looks very similar to the sorts of lace that can be seen on many 16th, 17th and 18th century portraits, such as this one, simply called Portrait of a Woman, by Johannes Cornelisz Verspronck, from around the middle of the 17th century.

And here is that piece. It measures 10cm wide by 275cm long.

The second is also pure linen, and is still fine, but is much wider. I think it also would have been used as a trim on clothing. It is really gorgeous.

Here is a picture of that piece, which measures 23cm wide by 250cm long.

To enter the raffle, please donate €5 for the first piece, and €10 for the second piece, to Abdalla’s Gofundme, for which the link is here - Abdalla’s Gofundme . Take a screenshot of your donation, and send it to my raffle email address (not my usual email address because it may get lost there, I am trying to keep raffle emails separate from my business). My raffle email address is lagrossetoile.deux@gmail.com . If you donate €15 or more, I will enter you for both raffles. I will pay postage for both pieces to the winners - if you have a box going with me that I can add the lace to, I will donate that postage cost to the fundraiser, or if you choose to pay postage costs I will ask you to give that amount to the fundraiser and I will post out. I will draw the winners next Wednesday evening, so you have until then to enter. If lace is not your thing, you can donate without emailing me your receipt!

We do this collectively, and we do it because we can. This is mutual aid in action, we do it also because we are all linked, we all hold each other, because it is clear that no government is coming to save any of us. Do it as practice in solidarity. Do it because you like me and I entice you with cool stuff! But do it, if you can, please do.

Incidentally the above photo was nicked from a cool webpage about lacemaking during the 17th century and there are some other fab images, including woodcuts of bobbin lace making. It’s well worth a read. It’s here.

Listen, my loves, thank you if you’ve made it this far with me. I really do appreciate it, and I will keep running these raffles. I’m hoping that you can get with the energy exchange, that you are not losing heart, that you are finding that the more you practice solidarity the more you are seeing that together we are incredibly powerful, and that one of the motives of empire is to wear us down and separate us. Textiles were always ways that kept community together, that helped us to show our identities and what was valuable to us - it is in that spirit that I’m continuing to use whatever leverage and beautiful stuff I have to extend community wherever needed. Thanks again xoxo.