Laces of Ireland

An article brought to our attention by one of our members – the text of a lecture titled “The Timeless Prestige of Kilrush Lace”, delivered by Tom Prendeville to the Kilrush Historical Society at An Teach Ceoil on Tuesday, September 23rd 2014 and stored in the Clare County Library was the starting point.

Around the 1800s, the Vandeleur family was involved in “planning a new modern town with broad commercial thoroughfares, a Market House constructed in 1808 as the centrepiece in a quadrangular confluence of the streetscapes.” Kilrush was a thriving town, but structured education was missing.

The article speaks about Colonel Crofton Vandeleur’s initiative of approaching Charles Walker, “the man credited with being the founder of Limerick lace.” “Walker, it seems, had chosen Limerick, a garrison town, because of its tradition of sewing gloves, military uniforms and white embroidery worked for shops in Glasgow and London. The history of Limerick lace shows that Mr Walker brought 24 young ladies from Nottingham and Coggeshall to Limerick to teach, at the outset, six local girls the lace-making skills of Nottingham and Coggeshall lace.”

According to the article, Vandeleur persuaded Charles Walker to visit Kilrush in the late 1830s and offered him rent-free premises for “a lace factory at the area known as the Manse, at Factory Lane, Lower Moore Street”. Walker opened his lace factory in Kilrush in 1839 bringing along Nottingham and Coggeshall lace-making tutors/trainers.

First, we had never heard there was lace ever made in Kilrush, and there are barely any traces left in the memory of locals (after all, this was almost 200 years ago!). Let us know if you have come across any lace piece made in Kilrush or have any family stories about this!

The “Amazing Lace” history of Limerick lace published in 2014 by Dr. Matthew Potter tells us:

“Charles Walker, the founder of Limerick lace, was born in Oxford, studied to become a clergyman but was never ordained.13 Possessed more of an aptitude for business than the church, he completed an apprenticeship with an engraver and copperplate printer in Oxford. He moved to London where he met the owner of a lace factory in the village of Marden Ash, near the little town of Chipping Ongar, Essex. He married Margaret, a widowed daughter of the owner, and moved to Marden Ash to manage the family lace factory. The newly established Essex lace industry had begun in 1816 when a French- Belgian lace maker named Drago and his two daughters introduced tambour lace making to the town of Coggeshall in Essex, near Chipping. Later the manufacture of Coggeshall lace spread to other parts of Essex. For this reason, it can be said that Limerick lace is directly descended from Coggeshall lace and as shall be seen below, to a lesser extent from Nottingham lace.”(Amazing Lace, p.26)

Was this French- Belgian lace maker named Drago from Lier? Or Luneville?

We don’t know for sure. But he seems to have brought to Essex the style known as Coggeshall lace, that was later on brought to Limerick by Charles Walker.

But when did the needle-run style emerge? 

“Walker and many of his successors produced tambour work, but needlerun, the second category of Limerick lace, was introduced to the city by Jonas Rolf (or Rolph), a lace merchant and manufacture of Coggeshall and Nottingham, and a director of Courtaulds, the British textile manufacturers. In the late 1830s, he established a factory in 20-21 Clare Street (which subsequently relocated to Patrick Street) and brought over Mary Mills, an experienced lace maker and designer from Coggeshall to train his workforce. Her husband also worked in the business as an accountant. In the 1870s and 1880s, Mary Mills had her own lace business in St John’s Square, which was eventually taken over by Cannock’s department store on George’s (now O’Connell) Street.68 Thereafter, the production of Limerick lace was divided between both tambour and needlerun lace.”(Amazing Lace, p.33)

And let’s not forget the Italian ricamo su tulle, and the Plauener Spitze in Germany.

Limerick lace is a proud member of the European family of embroidery on net style laces!