Lace in Translation

Quaker Lace designer Frederick Charles Vessey (1862-1948) grew up in the English county of Nottinghamshire that dominated the 19^th-century machine-made lace industry. By the age of 16, Vessey was already apprenticed to a Nottingham lace manufacturer and quickly learned the skills of lace design and pattern making.  His skill as a lace draftsman brought him to the attention of the Bromley family of Philadelphia, who were then in the process of setting up their first lace-making factory.  With his wife and five small children, Vessey emigrated to the United States in 1897, arriving in Philadelphia on the Fourth of July.  He served as head designer for Bromley Mills and its successor, Quaker Lace, for the rest of his career.

Based on the hundreds of original pencil, pen, and watercolor sketches in The Design Center’s collection, Vessey was a prolific draftsman.  He was encyclopedic in his approach to design, mining such varied sources as Egyptian tomb paintings, Jacobean architectural motifs, and tin ceiling catalogs to inspire and inform his lace designs.  Drawing widely on the fine and decorative arts of past ages, Vessey’s designs allowed middle-class Americans to consume the grandeur of Rococo France, the richness of the Ottoman Empire, and the glory of ancient Rome.