Prima parte de' fiori, page 7 (recto) 1591

Curator: We are looking at page 7 recto from *Prima parte de' fiori*, a book printed in 1591 by Giovanni Battista Ciotti, featuring various floral and geometric lace patterns. Editor: It has a rather stark presentation, doesn't it? All these geometric motifs laid out so rigidly. The contrast between the black background and delicate white patterns feels so…precise. Curator: Indeed. This book catered to a very specific and crucial demographic: women, particularly lacemakers in 16th-century Italy, empowering them in the workplace as many worked as textile designers. Editor: I see these rows of elaborate triangular shapes, floral motifs… How would these pages inform the designs? Are these patterns literally copied, or more like a springboard for creativity? Curator: A little of both. Lace was highly valued. These printed guides standardized fashionable forms while also allowing room for variation and skill within communities, mainly as forms of social advancement. We should not forget the cultural importance of lace-making in early modern Europe. It could be a very gendered position. Editor: The composition feels very intentional. Notice the different shapes within a rather rigid framework. The lines look sharp and definitive; engraving does allow for precision. Curator: It’s the accessibility and reach enabled by the print medium that made these designs influential, enabling standardized needlework skills for women of differing socioeconomic backgrounds. Lace patterns, like those reproduced here, appear again and again in portraiture across Europe during the 16th and 17th centuries. Editor: This has moved past purely ornamental for the home. This piece signifies agency; access to a new standard that anyone can utilize given the resources and social liberties to do so. The book provided an access point and democratized lace and other adornments. Curator: Precisely, it enabled early modern women in certain socioeconomic spheres to take an active role in creating and expressing their identities within the constraints that they operated under. Editor: The rigidness with which these patterns are placed betrays a freedom and accessibility that I would otherwise fail to appreciate from pure formal inspection.