This name is often applied to needlepoint
and pillow laces
in which the ground consists of ties or brides, but
it more properly
designates a kind of lace or passementerie, made with gimp of fine
wires whipped round with silk, and with cotton
thread. An earlier kind of
gimp was
formed with Cartisane, a little strip of this parchment or vellum covered
with silk, gold or silver thread. These stiff gimp threads, formed into a
pattern, were held together by stitches worked with the needle.
Gold
and silver thread laces have been usually made on the pillow, though
gold thread has been used with fine effect in 17th century
Italian needle
point laces.
