A shout out to crafty Janeites
There is so much Janeite creativity going on these days, we don’t know where to look.
We have been following the creation of a knitted “Jane Austen Dress” (we guess it will be a Regency-style dress, perhaps child-sized) at Panhandle Portals.
The always-Alert Baja Janeite sent us a link to an Etsy shop featuring prints and greeting cards with original drawings of 19th-century gowns along with quotations from Jane Austen. Very pretty and original!
Debbie Ritter’s Etsy shop features clothespin dolls in a variety of original designs, with a Literary Classics category that includes Jane Austen, Emma, and the Bennet sisters.
An oldie but a goodie…Baja Janeite reminded us about the Jane Austen handwriting font, created by Pia Frauss. It’s free to download for personal use (and we’ve made very good use of it here on AustenBlog).
We would also like to announce that we have recently added knotting a fringe to our list of accomplishments (Mr. Bingley would be so proud). It’s the world’s most boring craft. It’s all about the pretty shuttles and the pretty knotting bags and looking pretty while moving one’s hands gracefully. There’s only one character in Jane Austen’s novels who knots a fringe: Lady Bertram in Mansfield Park. A pretty, useless skill is right up her alley. 
Nonetheless, we are obsessed with making a knotting shuttle. Stay tuned for details. (And yes, we still can’t net a purse. Shut up.)
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LOL Mags! If knotting fringe makes one indolent and sedentary on a sofa, then STOP! If the fringe kit came with Pug, then we might reconsider our concern, but only if he can talk you into leaving the house for a walk.
Pug is Da Dog!
And what do you mean “makes one indolent and sedentary on a sofa”? I don’t need help in that department. (DOROTHY! Go cut the roses!)
Actually, I’ve been reading up on Mrs. Delany, whose letters are always quoted regarding knotting and 18th century needlework, and she apparently used her knotted fringe to beautifully enhance her quilting and embroidery. Somehow, though, I don’t think Lady Bertram ever followed through. She knotted her fringe and then she knotted some more fringe. And I dare say she wasn’t the only one!
How do you make a netted purse anyway? I have always wondered.
Here are some instructions on netting. When they refer to a “purse” I believe they mean a small bag used to carry money (like a miser’s purse or other small pouch) and not a handbag–that would be a reticule. I have mastered the basics of netting but can’t net a mesh fine enough that coins wouldn’t fall out of it, so that wouldn’t work very well for a purse, unless it was lined, I guess. (Maybe that’s my problem–I’m trying to solve a problem that doesn’t exist! Hmm.) I’m also assuming the ladies did netting with a finer needle like in those instructions, though here are pictures of another type of netting implement. Such an implement would have been used with heavier threads and strings for making nets for hunting or fishing such as those made by Captain Harville in Persuasion and also mentioned by Jane Austen in her letters (her nephews and I think her brother Frank made them). I saw this netting case at the V&A that had needles like the slim ones. And check these out–they look like they’re an awfully fine mesh. Okay, back to the drawing board…*mutters*
Yeesh – an accomplishment I will have to do without. I think Mr. Darcy was too quick to discount it…
Wow thanks for the netting a purse ideas. I I loves all of the info. I always wondered what that was.