Featured doilies: are they worth keeping?

dear all

are any of these 1920-40s as opposed to 1950-70s?
we don't use these any more and would rather see them being used instead of sitting in the drawer. i will have to clean them up, so any advice much appreciated. my first thought was soak in hot soapy water plus some bleach? would that work? also wondering if any of them were homemade?

regards
phaik hooi

 

more ....

 

It appears (to me anyway) that they all have hand work. The doilies in the first photo are a bit different. They appear to be Trapunto, but I can't recall ever seen this work on a doilie.

The hand embroidered ones look 40's give or take.

Sometimes doilies will fall apart from the age related stains.

Soak in warm water....maybe some lemon. I can't be sure of the added bleach. I think there is a bleach on the market now that can be used on delicates tho.

The interest in doilies in my area (10 mi n of Boston) has waned considerably. We used to sell tons....now we have tons left.

I still like them, and do use some at home.

 

I have a huge collection of doilies of this ilk and must accept that they are probably scrap value: sell in bulk for arts and crafts to cut and paste and turn into other things.

I'll keep the best but doilies have little value here, in Sydney, Australia. I shan't worry too much about washing mine.

 

yes doubt there's any interest in my part of the world either!
just wanted to know which ones i should keep, i.e. with the most family history, and which ones to donate to salvation army

 

here's a closeup of the first photo. is it some kind of embroidery?

 

The serious linen mavens become aghast at the mere mention of bleach in the care of linens, but I am using table and bed linens passed to me from family. My grandmother, mother and myself have all used chlorine type bleach when required and so far, (100+ years), so good. Try soaking them in very hot water with a laundry detergent containing bleach and see if that produces results you find acceptable. I change the water several times during the soaking process as it seems counter-productive to soak in dirty water. I rinse, rinse, rinse until there is no cloudiness from soap residue in the water, then roll in a towel to absorb excess moisture and iron while still wet, this gives a nice crisp finish without the use of starch.
Most of your examples show the result of a dear lady wanting to enhance their home and for this reason, I find it hard to discard them. The small pieces could be tied into drawer sachets, if lavender is available in your area that's lovely, but any dried fragrant plant might do. The larger pieces could be used in place of gift wrap.
To my amateur eye, #1 (trapunto I believe as Judy does), #5 & 6 crochet, #7&8 tatting, #10-12 embroidery, #13 crochet trim on machine made center and the last 4 embroidered place mats. The rest I believe are machine made and most of the hand worked examples would fall into the 1920's-40's range.
I hope you can find a way to utilize some of them and find appreciative homes for the rest.

 

yes dear lady indeed and that makes it very2 hard to discard anything in the home

 

Ive soaked old linens in buttermilk to fairly good results. My own dear granny was a doily fiend,she literally had 100s that she made stacked in drawers. I even thought about having them stitched together to make a bed spread. Along with 8000 other projects I need to get around to !

 

i thought i spotted one when i was clearing up but i can't find it anymore .... been looking since i saw your post perhaps i was mistaken

 

I love them. Always have.
I've soaked them in Tide for a few days.
WISK may work well too.
Used to clean my Navy whites to perfection with that.

 

Hi,
The best way I found was to wash them and dry them outside in the sun on the grass. For some reason between the sun and the grass it really brightens them. Also after the first snow stops I take my Oriental rugs out turn them upside down and beat them with a broom the amount of dirt even after vacuuming is amazing. Then take them in and the brightness of the pile will shock you. When I was younger and had a good job I would take them every Sep to the rug cleaner. It was an old cleaner that still used water to wash and rinse and then hang up in a three story drying area and then wrapped in brown paper and delivered to the house. God do I miss Brooklyn sometimes. My rugs were usually 5'x9' and cost 100 bucks to do, my big rugs 10'x15' were 125 bucks. When I moved down here I inquired at a big rug cleaner. I was horrified. They use a cleaning machine and tumble dry them. The cost was 350 dollars for the smaller rugs and 675 dollars for the larger ones.. The place in Brooklyn had concrete "wells" on the floor with 4" high walls in which the rugs soaked for several hours and then someone with a long handled scrub brush washed them and drained the "well" and rinsed them four or five times before hanging them up to dry. Now my rugs get cleaned with the snow.
greg

 

how do you dry them after sitting in the snow ?

 

Hi,
Bring them right in and lay them down and give a quick Hoovering. They will be perfectly dry in a few minutes especially if you have the heat on. I almost forgot to give them a quick brush with a broom when you pick them up.
greg

 

I have no advice on cleaning, but there are some sellers on etsy that only sell doilies if you want to lot them together (those that are not special in any way) and give that a go. The crafty folks seem to be able to find other uses for them.

 

SWEET!

 

I've done the same with my small scatter rugs.

They really do not get as saturated as you might think.

Mine are in the kitchen, and I just plop them back down on the "brick" linoleum.

 

if u toss them...remember to get every last one......
they multiply by osmosis ....
or at least mine do...!