Insertion.—Irish lace with raised ornaments.
Irish Lace.
Irish lace, also known under the name of Renaissance lace, from its having been first made in the sixteenth century, is an imitation of the earliest pillow laces; it ought, properly speaking, to be called French lace, having been invented in France and thence introduced into England and Ireland.
It is composed of braid or tape, formed into figures, joined together by needle-made, corded or button-hole bars and fillings of different kinds, or by bars alone.
The lace stitches and bars are almost the same as those used in fine Venetian point, but they are executed in a coarser material so that this section of our work may be considered as a preparation for the different kinds of lace, to be described in the next chapter.