Retro Knit Friday!

Been pretty busy this summer, working on the Victory garden and sewing. I have been sewing tops for the youngest daughter, and my knitting dwindled to a few pairs of socks I am working on. The spouse and I did go to an antique fair in a nearby town, and I did find lots of vintage patterns and needlework pamphlets to spend my birthday money stash on. My stash is now gone, but I did have fun spending it.

This pamphlet is in perfect condition and dates back to 1939. The idea behind this publication is stated on the inside front cover: "We feel that too long the crocheted dress has been a step-child in a wardrobe - beautifully and painstakingly made, perhaps, but often dowdy in design and fit. So we called in our staff of fashion experts and this original collection is the result.....Our fashion experts and designers got busy, treated crochet like fabric and we were as excited over the results as we know you are!" The cover shows a two-piece suit with a beautifully-fitted top crocheted in a striped pattern which is paired with a solid gored skirt. Very classy.
The bolero is shown on the inside front cover and on page 11, giving us two views of this useful garment. The description reads: "The smart bulky-above-the-waist look of a bolero cuts inches off your hips, and padded shoulders further the slenderizing illusion." These garments are crocheted with Knit-Cro-Sheen, a cotton thread that has been around a long time.

The dress below is called 'Leading Lady'. 'A star in your wardrobe - for this casual dress is at home both in city streets or on country club porches. As neat as a pin, with decorative zipper, high placed pockets, and wide belt'. Zippers were still a novelty design feature at this time and were featured prominantly in some garments.

All the instructions in this booklet were written for size 16, and the user was supposed to adjust them to fit. They did not give any advice on how to do this though.

My grandmother was always crocheting something. She often told me that all she had to do was look at a finished crocheted object in order to 'take the pattern' from it. She made lots of tablecloths, and I can't remember her crocheting anything out of yarn, since she mostly worked with cotton threads. I can imagine that lots of handwork went on in the evenings before TV was invented as ladies sat in front of the radio listening to their favorite shows.