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The History of Orenburg Lace - S1E5
209 Plays5 years ago
In the first half of this episode we discuss the history of Orenburg Lace knitting. Then, we’ll discuss finishing the Zetland shawl!
Links
- To get your copy of the pattern, and knit-a-long head over to Rachel’s pattern store on Ravelry (https://www.ravelry.com/designers/rachel-roden)
- To get the yarn Rachel recommends, head over to Jimmy Beans Wool (https://www.jimmybeanswool.com/knitting/yarn/BichesetBuches/LePetitLambswool.asp?showLarge=true&specPCVID=91487)
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Transcript
Introduction and Hosts
00:00:00
Speaker
You're listening to the Archaeology Podcast Network. Welcome to the Historical Yarns podcast, the show where we talk about knitting from the past and bring it into the present.
00:00:21
Speaker
Welcome to episode five of season one of the historical yarns podcast. I'm Rachel Rodin. And I'm Heather Boyd. And today we're talking about Orenburg lace knitting.
The Art of Orenburg Lace
00:00:36
Speaker
In episodes one through four of the podcast, we talked about the origins of Shetland and Estonian lace. So in this episode, we've moved on to Orenburg lace.
00:00:47
Speaker
So Orenburg Lace is, as you might have guessed, it is in Russia, southern Russia, on the Ural River. And it's near the border with Kazakhstan. So we're talking about really cold climate, winters, of course. High elevation. Yeah, high elevation. Really cold, basically. So once again, following the same thing. Cold place, lots of knitting. Knitting tradition.
00:01:14
Speaker
In this particular place, it actually is one of the only places in the world that Oranburg lakes or the only place that Oranburg lakes can be produced because Oranburg actually relies on a special type of goat down from these goats that only live in this area. And in fact, the climate is so crucial to how their hair develops.
00:01:34
Speaker
that other countries have tried to export them and grow them before they're down and it won't work. They just won't produce the down. It turns into regular sheep wool. So whatever it is about this climate, whatever combination of temperature and humidity and elevation, whatever it is,
00:01:55
Speaker
that makes the goats produce this very fine down, which is combed off of them each year. They don't even shear it, they comb it. Oh, interesting. Yeah, so, and from each sheep, they only get about a pound of down. So, not only is it rare, but it's, you know, not only is it localized, but it's also kind of rare.
00:02:14
Speaker
Not very much of it. Yeah. It's the finest goat fiber that can be produced. Yeah. I think I read that it, like it's compared to cashmere, like similar in feel and fluffiness and softness, but it's not called cashmere. I think because of the region, right? Kind of like how champagne is the only champagne in the champagne region. Never else. It's sparkly wine. It's kind of like that same thing from what I understood when I was reading about it. Yep. So it's super special.
00:02:40
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, very soft. It makes me want to find something so I can touch it. I know, right? I don't think I've ever seen any yarn made with it or... I don't think so either. Yeah. I mean, I read something while we were researching this about it. It also being it's finer even than Angora goat. Oh, wow. Which I was like, I didn't even know there was an Angora goat. Did you? Angora rabbits. Yeah, I guess. Well, maybe.
00:03:07
Speaker
I don't know. I'm not sure. I'm not sure if I knew that. Yeah. I was surprised to learn it anyway. So if you think of how Angora rabbit hair feels like Angora goat hair, I'm sure is just fine. This is even finer than that. And in terms of microns, like we're talking about science here, it is actually smaller. Yeah.
00:03:25
Speaker
Yeah, and it's that super fluffy stuff.
Historical and Economic Impact
00:03:28
Speaker
So one thing that I really noticed when I was looking at examples of these shawls, they've got that halo all over them because it's such a fine, fluffy yarn, similar to Angora, really. It kind of blurs the stitches a little bit. So it just makes this beautiful, fluffy, lofty shawl.
00:03:50
Speaker
Okay, so as from what we know about the early development of it, this is an older tradition from what we can tell, beginning in the early 1800s probably, maybe even before then. And it was a way for women to basically bring income to their families. You know, it's kind of a desolate area where it was developed. So again, it's
00:04:11
Speaker
enterprising women who are trying to find a way to make some extra income. And they, I guess, realized how amazing these goats were and started spinning up the yarn and making these beautiful shawls with it. And like Shetland, they have the, instead of sheep to shawl, it's goat to shawl. I mean, the women do every single step of the process. So they comb the sheep. Then they hand spin the goat fibers into this delicious yarn. And then they do the knitting and
00:04:40
Speaker
the marketing of it as well. So it's a completely self-contained industry, I guess you would say. The only thing that they've changed over the years is that instead of it being pure goat fiber now, you'll often see it blended with silk because it makes it more durable.
00:04:56
Speaker
It makes them less expensive to produce because it is so time consuming to comb the coats and hand spin their fibers. It allows them to produce more because they can use commercially produced silk fibers to blend with the goat hairs. And then also I read that the blended fiber holds its shape better than the goat fiber.
00:05:20
Speaker
That makes sense because those really fluffy fibers like that tend to get soft over time and just kind of lose their shape some.
Knitting Techniques and Creativity
00:05:30
Speaker
Oh, that's the fiber. And then of course the needles that they were working with were primarily metal, like stainless steel. And I guess they liked them to be really, really short. Like they didn't like working with long, long needles and they called them pins similar to how Shetland folks called their needles knitting pins. Um, the Russian word is spits, I think it is. And I thought it was neat because it's also the same word for bicycle spokes. So.
00:05:57
Speaker
It looks sort of similar. Yeah, and like, I guess if you're working on such fine lace, you would be using a piece of metal that thin. It's like a size foot zero. Oh my gosh, imagine if you lost that in the couch. Yeah, that's never coming back. Or you sit on it. I've definitely done that before. Oh, that's even horrible. Yeah, it's awful. Oh my gosh.
00:06:20
Speaker
So as far as the knitting goes, the stitches are on a garter stitch foundation similar to the Shetland tradition that we've already talked about. It makes a very squishy fabric of course and then you can also tell that it's an older tradition because they didn't have the purl stitch yet when they first started creating these techniques.
00:06:42
Speaker
Another super interesting thing. This is like, this was the biggest thing that I learned when researching this is that they don't use the SSK or slip slip knit because I know usually you would use that to get your stitches to slant in whatever direction you wanted them to slant, but they apparently the, these particular stitch patterns, the slant is not a big, yeah, it's just not important to them the way they're constructed or whatever. Maybe that's why they don't have that many stitch
00:07:10
Speaker
patterns. Yeah. So all their stitches are built on a yarn over knit two together foundation. Um, so yeah, I guess this land is not important. I would, I would find it really hard to let go of that. Cause I feel like this land is always so important. Um, I haven't knitted an Oren Berg shawl, so I'd have it either. But they do look beautiful. And if you, if you're not familiar with what they look like, it is, it's
00:07:33
Speaker
almost like, I would say almost like a combo of Shetland and Estonian appearance. Like they have texture to them somewhat, but they also have that same square shape or rectangular shape and like a really airy look to them and that sort of cobwebby look.
00:07:50
Speaker
Yeah. Cause they still do that similar like center section and then your inner border, outer border, you know, that you're attaching in various different ways, like picking up stitches and grafting and all the other techniques that we talked about in the other traditions. So they're constructed very similarly, but they only have 10 different stitches that they would use. So I love the names of them. I actually have them written down here, so I'm going to read them.
00:08:15
Speaker
Peas, honeycomb, fish eyes, mouse prints. So cute. Strawberries, large strawberries, cat's paws, accordion, chain hearts, and diagonals. Those are the 10 stitches. That's it. That's all of them. Oh, that's amazing. I know. It feels a little bit limiting when you first see that there's only 10. But when you see the beautiful shawls that they have made in combination of these different stitches,
00:08:45
Speaker
It's amazing the different variety that they are able to get with that. Yeah, especially if you use one motif in the center and then another for the for the border and another for the edging. I mean, then you've got, you know, a lot of visual interest there.
00:08:59
Speaker
Yeah, they also, uh, they're, they're borders. Now I actually didn't read too much about how they construct this very specific borders, but they're, but they called their borders teeth actually, because whereas the other ones we've talked about have had sort of like a scalloped or a wavy edge that's blocked into shape. Yeah.
00:09:17
Speaker
Yeah, yeah, these are knitted in yes. Yeah, so they are they're like They're very very structural As opposed to the other ones where you have to kind of force it to happen in the blocking which is just another aspect about them that is different but
00:09:34
Speaker
I like that a lot. It gives it kind of a zigzag look along the edge there. Yeah, that like sawtooth or whatever. Sawtooth, yeah. And then also when you're knitting the pieces, they are apparently very particular about making sure that you have a slip stitch edge. Oh, actually, I don't think we mentioned this in our previous episodes, but one
00:09:54
Speaker
There's lots of different ways to make a nice, easy edge for picking up stitches. And with Shetland, and I'm not sure about Estonian, but definitely with Shetland, they do a yarn over at the beginning of the row. And then the next stitch, you would basically bind off the next stitch. So you knit it, then knit the third stitch, and then bind off the second stitch.
00:10:14
Speaker
And yeah, really interesting, right? So it leaves a little loop. Yeah, it leaves a little loop that is really easy to go back and pick up later on when you're adding your next panel or your border or whatever it is that you're doing. So they did that a lot in those. And then for the Orenburg tradition, they tended to just do a slip stitch edge, which is also really easy to pick up stitches into because a slip stitch edge will basically represent two rows. So you'll get one stitch for every two rows that you knit.
00:10:42
Speaker
So yeah, that's some of the construction techniques for making your shawls.
Varieties of Shawls
00:10:49
Speaker
And they do the squares and rectangular, and you can see more modern ones that are triangular, but they tended to stick in the square realm more than anything else.
00:11:00
Speaker
So, as far as the types of garments that they made, I mean, we're talking primarily about the very lace, the fine lace cobweb shawls, but Orenburg lace is also used in their everyday sorts of shawls and garments that they wore just around to do their work or whatever, and those are often made of much heavier materials. Yeah, I don't think they used the fine Orenburg fiber, the down, to make those, or maybe they did.
00:11:27
Speaker
I just know that they were thicker, so they would use a thicker yarn to be spun heavier or plied or many plies, whatever. They would make these heavier pieces that they could actually wear outside because it was so cold that those airy things that they would make to sell to the upper class just weren't going to cut it.
00:11:44
Speaker
I'm working on a farm or whatever the day-to-day life was. As warm as it is, it's still full of holes. I'm shocked about this. Lace is inherently holy. And that wind blows. But the names of those pieces, they would call them kerchiefs or patinkas. That was like your everyday working woman kind of shawl that they would make.
00:12:11
Speaker
But the the fine ones, of course, were extremely light and airy and gauzy. So beautiful, super beautiful. All right. Well, that is it for Orenburg lace. We're going to take a quick break and then we will come back and talk about the next section of the knit along pattern.
00:12:30
Speaker
Welcome back to episode five. So if you've been knitting along with us, you should be ready to move on to the other side of your shawl. If you haven't grabbed a copy of the pattern yet, you can get that on Ravelry. It's the Zetlin Shawl, Z-E-T-L-A-N-D. If you just search for that, it'll come right up for you. And you might want to listen back to the previous episodes too, because we have broken down all of the stitches in the construction and the materials and all that for you back then.
00:12:55
Speaker
Check that out and then head back over and join us for the section five. So, like I said, section five, it feels like it's just one little section, but it's actually a giant chunk of knitting.
Companions and Motivation in Knitting
00:13:09
Speaker
And it's knitting you've just done recently, so you may be feeling that, like, the same sort of thing you feel about second socks, you know, the second sock syndrome.
00:13:18
Speaker
But you got to get over that hump because this is worth it and looking at the shawl and also touching it. I'm going to steal it from Rachel. She's just better be prepared. But yeah, I love the shape and everything about it. And honestly, you know, now that you've done it once.
00:13:35
Speaker
You know what? It's like motivational. Find your favorite show. Or if you haven't caught up on our podcast yet, just binge listen to the podcast while you are just slogging through the rest of this. And it's not a slog because these types of lace are so interesting. They definitely keep your mind engaged. And then you do have the break of the rest of the garter stitch rows mixed in between.
00:14:02
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. I definitely, yeah, get you some TV that you can maybe just listen to because you're going to have to be looking at the pattern the whole time. So rewatch friends or something like that. Or the Harry Potter movies. I love rewatching those while I'm doing something that I can't look at. I know, right? I've been reading all the Harry Potter books. I've just finished.
00:14:25
Speaker
You guys don't know this, but I have a little baby. He's only four months old now, but I can't concentrate on any real books at night because I'm so tired. So I just need something that I don't have to concentrate on or remember.
00:14:40
Speaker
Yeah, I do that with knitting too when I have to actually follow a pattern. And you will with this. I had my chart to open next to me the whole time on my iPad and then I have this little highlighter bar that I moved down and kind of use it like highlighter tape. That's how I keep track of my place in my charts. And I thought like I might get to a point where I would just remember what the next row was. No, not happening. No, not when they're long and also have their separate types of lace within each row.
00:15:05
Speaker
Yeah, and you're increasing and decreasing to get the chevron shape or whatever. But if you are a challenge motivated person, as I used to be, I think, before I had children, when I used to have to do knitting like this, I would set a timer and then I'd see if I could beat the timer to get my row done in a certain number of minutes and then calculate my stitches per minute. Oh my God, that's awesome.
00:15:30
Speaker
That's the type of thing that motivates you set your little timer and like, you know, do a little stopwatch at the end of each row or whatever and see how fast you can get. I think I might be kind of sad about it though, so I'm not going to.
00:15:46
Speaker
How slow it actually is. You don't want to give up. Well, I'm a thrower, not a picker. And throwing is just inherently slower. But you know what, Rachel? You're a plotter. You get it done. That's the thing. You don't think you're a fast knitter, but you finish projects faster than faster knitters do because you just keep going. Yeah, that's true. I will knit for hours in a row, for sure, without a problem. You knit everywhere. I've knit with this girl in the movie theaters, y'all.
00:16:14
Speaker
Oh, yeah. Give me some stockinette in the round. In restaurants, everywhere. If you see her reaching into her purse, you know she's taking out some knitting. That's how it works. Anyway, so yeah, just take this project along with you. Get her a pretty knitting bag. Maybe, and your charts, or your instructions. It's hard to cut her up, but you can do it. As long as you're not drinking, you should be fine, right? Yeah, for sure.
00:16:39
Speaker
Yeah, but basically all of that is to say that you are repeating exactly what you have just done on the other side of the shawl. And it's not even like a mirror or anything like that because everything is all symmetrical. So it's just the exact same thing
Mastering Blocking Techniques
00:16:54
Speaker
again. So you don't have to worry about reversing anything. Just go back and follow the exact pattern instructions.
00:17:00
Speaker
when you reach the glorious end. Mm-hmm. It's time for blocking. Yeah. So we'll go over like specific finishing and blocking techniques and stuff next week. But we thought we would just give you a list of our favorite tools so that you would know what you got to get your hands on now to be ready for blocking when you're finished.
00:17:19
Speaker
I think the main one, and I'm going to let Heather tell you guys about this because she uses them in a way that I hadn't thought about and I'm definitely going to try next time I'm blocking something. But there is a tool from Knitter's Pride called the Knit Blockers, and man are they the most handy tool that were ever invented for blocking. They've changed my life. I will never go back to blocking with
00:17:39
Speaker
steel pins. Ever. No way. So they're basically blocks of like acrylic probably. Yeah, like a hard plastic. With needles embedded in rows. And they come in different sizes. So there's some that are as small as like three needles long and some that are as... I think it's four and eight. Four pins and some that are eight pins. Okay. So yeah, but they're ingenious because you can grab a whole sort of section of your side of your knitting or your end and you can block it completely straight.
00:18:07
Speaker
I don't know how your blocking mats are. They need to be used with blocking mats. We should reiterate that. They have to have some sort of foam mat because the pins are very sharp. And in fact, if you accidentally poke it through on yourself or on your prized mahogany table, you're going to be pretty pissed. I've definitely drawn blood with these before. They are sharp. Yeah, they are.
00:18:28
Speaker
So, I would put even a towel underneath your blocking mats if you're doing it on a surface that you don't want damaged because if they come through the backside, they're going to poke whatever's underneath. But, it's great that they're thin and sharp because they go right between your stitches on the edge of your work and you pull it out to whatever shape you want. And the great things about them are is that, you know, you just really need one set. You can get as many sets as you want. I mean, go for it and use them all the way around the perimeter of your project.
00:18:58
Speaker
But the other thing you can do with them is in something with long straight sides like this, you can thread a piece of sewing thread, a thin piece of yarn that's color fast, cotton string or whatever, through one of the holes on the knit blockers. They have these special little holes poked in the top corners of them. Thread through a string there and tie it off and then put it the other end on a tapestry needle and sort of whip stitch down the edge of your project.
00:19:26
Speaker
Like pretty far away, like every inch or so, right? Like you don't have to do it. Every two inches. Yeah. Just so you don't want to bind up the edge. You just want to get it on the very outside edge and then pull it as long as you want it. You know, like keep going until you get to the end of your project. Leave yourself some slack in your thread so that you can pull your project down along the thread.
00:19:46
Speaker
Yeah, however far you want to stretch your project out, make sure you've got that much give in the thread itself. In the thread that you're using, yeah. And then tie the other end of the thread through another knit blocker at the opposite end, stick it in the blocking mat, and then you're done with that side. Like that thread threaded through the two holes will keep it perfectly straight, and then you do the same thing on the other side. You can even do that on your ends.
00:20:10
Speaker
put knit blockers all along the edge of mine. And then like lay it all out on my mats and get the sides done and then do the other end. Anyway, it's just an ingenious product.
00:20:25
Speaker
product. I had never used them that way. I just have two sets of them because I didn't know that you could run the string down in between and pull it tight for blocking. So that is super cool. You just wanted the colorful ones. I know I did. They were not colored, they were just white and now she's got a set of the interesting rainbow ones. They're prettier so had to have them.
00:20:46
Speaker
But so that method really does the same thing as like a blocking wire would do. So if you have blocking wires, they work the same way. This is going to be a significantly long project. I don't know if you'll have a wire that long or you'll have to combine two wires. Yeah, I think probably like three wires along the long edge if you choose to use wires.
00:21:03
Speaker
Yeah, you'll just be pulling that out and using T pins. You can use knit blockers with the wires as well. I've definitely done that before too, but I kind of abandoned it when it's a nice straight edge because the knit blockers do such a good job on their own. They don't really need the wires, but you know, if you prefer, you can do it that way.
00:21:20
Speaker
And T-pins, too. I mean, they still get the job done. No shade on T-pins. They're good for what they are, but we just have this love affair with this one particular tool. And if you have small children around your house and you don't like to see them walking up to you with the steel straight pin in their mouth, then you may want to try the other way.
00:21:39
Speaker
Yeah, for sure. Because that's definitely happened to me. Well, you know, I was just thinking the knit blockers are actually kind of similar to the Shetland or the, I guess it's all the different groups of people would use those blocking frames with the pins in them. So the blockers are actually kind of mimicking what they would do with those big frames. So in this case, like if you're trying to keep it historical, it would be the closest option to what the ladies would do 100 years ago.
00:22:07
Speaker
That would be cool. So the other thing, you're definitely going to need a measuring tape for this, right, to make sure your sides are symmetrical. For sure. Yeah. Like you can kind of like let the yarn dictate how big it gets. You know, you don't want to overstretch. But if you, but you do want both sides to be equal. So make sure you got a tape measure handy so that you're pulling the two from the middle point out to the same place. That's all I would recommend for that.
00:22:31
Speaker
Okay, and then also get some get a nice soak wash or wool rinse of some sort I like the kind that you don't have to rinse out that you can just soak and then gently squish the water out and Then not have to rinse it out. So like soak and nickel in would you recommend people doing the towel method where they roll this in a towel? Or is it too felty? Oh
00:22:51
Speaker
It might be too fealty. I did not roll it in towel when I blocked it. I just gently pressed the water out. Now we live in Nevada. It's super dry here. So even though I didn't roll it to get the water out, it's still dried in like a day. You can always put it in your washing machine on just the spin only setting. If you have a spin only setting, it will spin all the water out for you.
00:23:15
Speaker
and you won't have to rub it against anything but the metal bin of your washing machine. Or if you have a giant salad spinner, you can do it in there too. Oh yeah, I mean that would be some size salad spinner though. It would be a really giant salad spinner.
00:23:26
Speaker
You're fitting 950 yards of shawl in there. That's all up. I mean, I don't even know how you would pump it. You'd have to step on it. Sure leg muscles. Okay, that's a terrible recommendation. Don't do that. No, I want to see somebody try. He's like, that interests you back. Anyway, I think that covers all the materials that you'll probably need for blocking. And as always, it's whatever your favorite tools are.
00:23:48
Speaker
Yeah. I mean, I've definitely blocked using T-pins through a garbage bag into a bed because I didn't have mats and I didn't have wires and I didn't have anything. So, you know, use what you've got available. You can make it work. But these are the tools that we recommend because we like them.
00:24:05
Speaker
All right, well, I think that about wraps it up for both the section five repeat slog knitting section and also the items that you're going to need for blocking.
Conclusion and Social Media
00:24:17
Speaker
So check back next week and we will give you some more tips on how to get the right shape and what to do with your blocking and also how to finish it up in general. So yeah, thanks for listening and happy knitting.
00:24:36
Speaker
Thanks so much for listening. You can find me on Ravelry and on all the socials as Rachel Unraveled. And you can find Heather on Ravelry as HeatherBoyd84. Be sure to like and subscribe the podcast wherever you found it, and we'll see you next time. Happy knitting!
00:24:53
Speaker
This show is produced and recorded by the Archaeology Podcast Network, Chris Webster and Tristan Boyle, in Reno, Nevada at the Reno Collective. This has been a presentation of the Archaeology Podcast Network. Visit us on the web for show notes and other podcasts at www.archpodnet.com. Contact us at chrisatarchaeologypodcastnetwork.com.