MY HOOKY TREASURE

Designer Elisabeth Davis de Herraiz details how she revived a very special heirloom piece of crochet.

While I mainly design shawls and other accessories myself, another of my biggest crochet loves is lacy doilies and there’s one in particular that’s very special to me. In fact, it’s my most valued crochet item because it’s completely irreplaceable – my grandmother’s handmade doily.

My grandma died a few years ago, and I was visiting my grandad a couple of years later when I saw a doily on the windowsill that I remembered seeing when I was little. I asked him if my grandma had made it. He told me she had and then pulled out another, identical doily, telling me I could have it as a reminder of her. As I spent a lot of time with my grandparents when I was little and have lots of wonderful memories, being given this was a lovely reminder of my grandma.

The doily was in quite bad shape and I didn’t know if I’d be able to fix it – it had lost its shape after years of use, part of it had been ripped and there was a big tea stain on it. I had to wash it (I’ve never washed an item with such care!), fix the torn stitches and then block it. When it turned out so beautifully, I was so happy!

I decided to try and replicate the pattern by working from the original doily. But as I searched on Ravelry to see if I could find any similar patterns, I couldn’t believe my luck when I clicked on one of the photos and saw it was the same doily and, even better, there was a link to the pattern! It’s called the Irish Rose Doily and it was published in 1949. It’s a vintage pattern now and is available free online at www.ravelry.com

My version was quite a fast make and took just a weekend. I used size 6 white crochet thread for the main part and size 10 pink and green crochet thread for the flowers and leaves. The yarn is a very fine, 100% cotton that I chose because it was a close match to the thread my grandma had used for the original doily.

This was also the first time that I’d tried Irish crochet, which is where motifs are joined with mesh stitches to form lace. It’s a fairly simple pattern that features mainly double crochet and chain spaces.

I wanted to find a way to enjoy the doilies every day, and since I have some of my yarn stash in two wicker baskets next to my desk, I decided to use the doilies to decorate them. This way I’m reminded of my grandma each time I look at my basket. I’ve had a lot of positive feedback about this unusual way of displaying them!