An elegant hat (ca.1850)

The Royal Victoria Knitting Book : containing an assortment of the most elegant patterns for hats, hoods, feathers, and bonnets, published in London by W. Clark, possibly in 1850, gives patterns for some very charming knitted hats and bonnets indeed.  The Victoria Knitting Book was published in installments; the copy at the Internet Archive linked above contains pages 85-96 (breaking off right in the middle of a pattern!); the full book can be seen here, courtesy of the Richard Rutt Collection at the University of Southampton.  Other installments focused on lace edgings and insertions, cuffs and collars, doilies and antimacassars, polkas, stockings, shawls, etc.

Here is the pattern for the exquisitely lacy hat No. 40, at top in the image above --

The "curtain" is the part of a bonnet or hat that covers the back of the wearer's neck. 

Knitting sampler (18th century)

Detail of an 18th-century knitting sampler, probably German, in the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, Elizabeth Day McCormick Collection, no.43.1022.

In the collection of the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston is a knitting sampler of lace patterns.  Unusually, this particular sampler is all of circular pieces knitted in fine cotton yarn, each joined to the next by some kind of small ligature, presumably also knitted, and then the whole chain is bound with a length of silk ribbon, the piece at each end also decorated with fluffy bows of the same red ribbon.  Each piece is a little under 14cm (not quite 6 in.); there appear to be thirty-one pieces altogether.  The Museum's description also notes that the sampler is backed with paper, though whether this is original or a conservation backing is not stated.  

Presumably this is a selection by the maker of doily patterns?

The MFA is quite strict about usage of their photographs of objects in their collection, and so I have included only a small cropped part in order to give an idea of the general shape, but it is well worth a virtual visit to see this fascinating piece and the maker's selection of patterns!

Man's cap (18th-century Italy)

Detail of a "man's night cap" at the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, no,38.1281.

The Museum of Fine Arts in Boston has in their collection what is described as a "man's night cap of natural linen knit in lace pattern," being a "conical cap with knitted ornament on top."  ("Ornament" is rather grand for the fairly-typical modest "tail" at the top of this cap, but there it is.)

The MFA is quite strict about usage of their photographs of objects in their collection, and so I have included only a small cropped part in order to show the lace stitch; it is well worth a visit even virtually to see the shape of this interesting cap, and to ponder whether it would be much use as a cap for sleeping in, or if perhaps "night cap" is a more general term for informal wear.

The cap looks, by the way, to have been knitted from the bottom up, possibly switching from right-side to wrong-side so that both the brim and the head sections show right-side-out.

Ladies' knitted square shawl (1892)

This pretty shawl from the 1892 "Delineator" magazine has a center field worked in blackberry stitch, still a popular choice for shawls etc. today. Somewhat unusually, a measurement for a finished section is given -- on the other hand, eighteen inches (45-46 cm) for the center, even allowing maybe half again for the borders, seems on the small side for a shawl, but perhaps it is meant for the shoulders.

Blackberry stitch is known by many names: trinity, bramble, raspberry, cluster. Slight variations abound, as one might expect!

Blackberry Stitch à la The Delineator

Over a multiple of 4 sts.

Row 1 (RS): *(K1, P1, K1) all in the same st, P3tog, rep from * to end.

Row 2: Purl.

Row 3: *P3tog, (K1, P1, K1) all in the same st, rep from * across. 

Row 4: Purl. 

Repeat these four rows for pattern. 

(A "Delineator" reader was apparently confused by this stitch, as a paragraph appeared in the "Answers to Correspondents" column of a later issue, viz., "[To] Miss M. R. : In knitting ladies' square shawl, first row knit 1, purl 1, and knit 1 out of 1 or next stitch, thus making 3, which you will find take the place of the 3 stitches purled together. This will neither widen nor narrow, but keep the shawl square. Treat the third row in the same manner" [v.41, p.xvi].)

"Knitted Yoke for a Corset Cover" (1897)

This 1897 pattern for a lacy yoke for a corset cover is from the American magazine "The Delineator" (v.49, pp.590-591), available free from the Hathi Trust, via Google and the University of Iowa. The yoke would be sewn to a fabric bodice, buttoned in the front.

A corset cover was a garment worn over a corset to smooth the lines under one's dress, and also to protect the inside of the dress from the hardware of the corset.  Corset covers began to be worn in the 1860s, when smoothness of the close-fitting bodices became the ideal, and they continued to be worn through the Edwardian period, presumably as long as corsets themselves were worn.  See the post at Historical Sewing for examples.

The young lady on the left has a smooth bodice, whereas the young lady on the right has a slight "dent" from her undergarments just above the bust. Images via Flashbak.

"The Knitted Lace Collar Receipt Book"

Mrs. G.J. Baynes's The Knitted Lace Collar Receipt Book (1846) seems to have proved so popular that it went into multiple editions and series with new patterns.  Scans of the fourth edition of 1846 are available free at Archive.org and the Online Books Page, and modern knitted-up examples of a number of its patterns can be found at the book's Ravelry page.  Other modern knitters have worked some of Mrs. Baynes's lace collars, such as the blogger at One More Stitch who discusses her version of Collar no.2 here and here (commenting that the pattern is "clearly written and enjoyable to knit which led me to reflect that in less than ten years [since the publication of The Workwoman's Guide], the art of pattern writing, including the suggestion of needle sizes and materials, had become vastly improved"!) and here.

In addition to the Lace Collar book, Mrs. Baynes also wrote The Album of Fancy Needlework (1847) -- "or, novelties in knitting, netting, and crochet : both useful and ornamental" -- The Berlin Wool Home and Opera Cap Receipt Book (1849), and The Oriental Book of Crochet and Bead Work (1857), which may (also?) have appeared in La Mode Winter Book volume 1 of 1847, possibly a compilation of various needlework books or pamphlets by Eliza Warren, Eléonore Riego de la Branchardière, and others.

Anne (or Ann) Baynes, née Cox (1809-1883), was the wife of bookseller Godfrey John Baynes of Gravesend, Kent, who kept a "circulating library, Berlin wool and fancy depot" (a shop where one purchased "fancy goods," that is, notions and supplies for making decorative items) at 60, Windmill Street, and later at 60-61 High Street in that same town; he published and printed most if not all of his wife's needlework booklets.

Sources

Goulden, R.J. "A biographical dictionary of those engaged in the Kent book trade, 1750-1900, vol.1 A-L" (Croyden : [R.J. Goulden?], 2014), p.64.

"Miss Dewing's Fancy Depot," The Brisbane (Queensland) Courier, 17 December 1900, p.3.

The Jenny Lind collar

 

Jenny Lind, 1850. (Library of Congress, LC-DIG-ppmsca-38268). Lind was noted for her modest clothing and demeanor, in the days when women on the stage were thought to be little better than prostitutes.

 These collars are all of the "Jenny Lind" type, named for the wildly-popular Swedish soprano of the 1840s and 50s.  Note the slight differences here and there, which may be due to local fashion, the date, or the ladies themselves.

Said to be dated 1852.

 

Maria L. Smiley, Philadelphia, 1851. (Historical Society of Pennsylvania) 

 

 This young woman has gussied up her collar with a wide ribbon underneath.

 Mrs. Warren published a collar of "Swedish lace à la Jenny Lind" in her Point Lace Crochet Collar Book (Second Series) in 1847 --

Miss Mary Campbell's Shetland shawl

Shetland shawl of cream wool, in the collection of the National Museums of Scotland in Edinburgh.

The National Museums of Scotland write, "This shawl of handspun and handknitted wool was made in Shetland. It was given to Miss Mary Campbell of Jura on the occasion of her marriage in 1863 and is a copy of the shawl presented that year to Princess Alexandra of Wales by the Shetland Islanders."

The dimensions of the shawl are given as 2400 mm x 1230 mm (about 95 in. by 49 in.).

For a modern interpretation of this shawl, see "The Princess Shawl" by Shannon Miller.

(It seems to me, by the way, certainly not an expert on Shetland lace, that the triangular shape is rather unusual, perhaps even wildly so.  Most of the "traditional" lace shawls I've seen, and certainly the ones blocking in this well-known period photo --

are square, and so I will tag this post with the "earliest known" label until further notice ...!)