A. Blackborne & Company

Poster for the exhibition Fine and Fashionable: Lace from the Blackborne Collection. The Bowes Museum 2006-2007. Poster for the exhibition Fine and Fashionable: Lace from the Blackborne Collection. The Bowes Museum 2006-2007.

A. Blackborne & Company was the trade name of father Anthony (1824-1878) and son Arthur Blackborne (1856-1952), lace dealers. They began work around 1850 and operated their business from 35 South Audley Street, London (UK), near the fashionable shopping areas of Bond Street and Oxford Street. They held a Royal Warrant from 1863 to 1912 from Alexandra, Princess of Wales and later the Queen.

The Blackborne company sold modern lace, but also bought antique lace for re-sale (for example, a raised needle lace seventeenth century Italian chasuble was sold to the Victoria and Albert Museum in 1870 for GBP 100) and to study techniques and patterns.

In 2006 the descendants of Anthony and Arthur Blackborne gave the remaining stock, study collection and accompanying documents to the Bowes Museum (UK). Gathered in unsorted trunks, this collection amounted to some 7000 pieces of lace, including a man’s needle lace collar possibly worn by King Charles I of England.

The Bowes Museum put on display some two hundred pieces from the collection in an exhibition entitled Fine & Fashionable, which ran from September 2006 to April 2007. The collar was lent to the Royal Collection Trust as part of a prestigious exhibition, called In Fine Style: The Art of Tudor and Stuart Fashion, which was on display in The Queen’s Gallery, Buckingham Palace from 10 May 2013 until 6 October 2013. The collar was put on display next to the famous triple portrait of Charles I, painted by Anthony van Dyck. The painting shows three portraits of Charles I, each of whom is wearing a similar, needle lace collar.

Sources: HASHAGEN, Joanna and Santina M. Levey (2006). Fine & Fashionable: Lace from the Blackborne Collection, Bowes Museum, Barnard Castle, Durham.

Digital sources:

Digital source of illustration (retrieved 21 March 2017).

SA

Last modified on Tuesday, 21 March 2017 19:37
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