Fashioning history: The Lace Museum in Horst

Swoosh, clatter, bang, whir! Antique lace machines rumble away inside the Museum de Kantfabriek - the lace museum – in the village of Horst in north Limburg. The machines churn out ever so delicate laces, despite the primitive-looking wooden patterns that control the process. A rare sense of history come alive fills the former factory, and many volunteer staff members still remember the days when the lace factory was a real industry in town.

The Museum de Kantfabriek is a delightful community center with outreach programs in the textile industry, the arts, and the local region.

Anyone searching for an entertaining, educational, and unique excursion need look no farther for a place to soak in history, enjoy art, and feel pleasantly welcomed.

According to museum documentation, in 1928, a cigar manufacturer in the town of Horst, Andreas Couwmans, bought 46 used lace making machines and opened a factory. The Southern Dutch Lace Factory soon became a large industry in the town of Horst, exporting cotton lace (and later nylon) all over the world – principally to the Dutch East Indies. Unfortunately, Couwmans and both possible successors died in WWII and the business went into bad management just as competition began to grow from developing countries. The lace factory went into a slow decline for the next fifty years.

The lace museum’s founders, Ietje and Jan Janssen, love to discuss the history of the lace factory in their town – and both the bright eyed, spry retirees have a wealth of knowledge about it. They seem to love searching for ways to improve their museum even more than talking about it. The Janssens actively search for collaborators in the fields of textile production, art, and scholarship, finding unique ways to share their love for Dutch history and culture.

A volunteer’s experience
Last spring, visiting textile artist and Dutch native, Annet Couwenberg, joined the museum from the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA) to learn about the history of lace production in the Netherlands and to produce a unique art lace that will be included in her upcoming work. Ietje and Jan welcomed her to their team with their special brand of hospitality – open arms and open coffee bar – and she went to work researching historical Dutch head-wear like poffars and bonnets, in addition to the hand-crafting process that Dutch women used to make lace all the way through the first world war – and till today, for fun.

The product of this joint effort was an orange nylon art lace, which Annet will use in a work relating to the subject of dress and identity – particularly Dutch identity. Other collaborations are in the works, and the Janssens continue building relationships between the village of Horst and the world of art, craft, and history.

Saving the old lace factory
When the Janssens heard of an opportunity to purchase the old lace factory in 2006, they were running Horst’s historical society, but were facing the end of their lease, with no way to keep the society at its current location. They jumped into high gear to secure the lace factory, fending off local politicians’ plans to demolish the building, and raising enough money to purchase it. Once they owned the building, they realized the gold mine – and the heap of work – that they had managed to secure.

Inside the old factory, the attic was filled floor to ceiling with old lace making patterns, fabric, machines, spare parts, and cast-off furniture and boxes. The office was a mess of hand-written account books and illegible lace patterns. With the help of the factory founder’s grandson Mr. Aart Peters, a former factory worker Sef Kellenaers, and a devoted team of over 145 volunteers, the lace machines were brought back to working order, the building was renovated, and the history of the place was unraveled.

Eventually the new “Museum Foundation of The Lace Factory” managed to raise over 450,000 Euros from the local council, the VSB Fund, and Rabobank, plus countless other small donations from local industry and individuals. In addition, with the help of Eindhoven’s exhibition design company, Marcel Wouters Designers, they created a permanent exhibit that tells the history of the museum.

By 2008, the museum had opened in the old lace factory. The front of the building had been renovated to include an intimately modern café, where delicious coffee drinks and tasty lunch or tea-time snacks can be purchased, and where a smattering of crafty gifts and art books are on offer. Of course, the lace produced by the museum’s machines is offered for sale, and it is a fun way to support the museum while indulging in a bit of historical finery.

Binary codes and lace patterns
The lace machines in the museum are one of the earliest examples of computing technology. They look simple from above, with a circular metal bed ringed with cotton-threaded bobbins. But they hide a complicated system of gears and pulleys below. When the machine is turned on, a loop of wooden punch cards are cycled through the machine, and the gears and pulleys react to the binary code drilled into the wood. Each unique binary code causes a different group of bobbins to twist around each other, knitting the cotton threads together into lace. When the lace comes off the machine, it is knitted in a circle, and has to be sliced up one side to lay flat.

Despite their age, the machines are still difficult to comprehend, and the lace patterns created by the wooden-punch cards might make better sense to a computer scientist. When the machines are going, the clanking metal thunders through the factory and the lace seems to whir off the bobbins.

Watching the machines from a safe distance, with the odor of oil and cotton in the air, the viewer feels at once like they have landed in 1930’s Horst and as though they are in an incredibly modern factory. It’s an unexpectedly humbling encounter, particularly in light of the work that the Janssens and their dedicated volunteers have done to preserve the experience.

If you’re looking for some indoor entertainments for the fall, put the Museum de Kantfabriek in Horst, on your list and prepare to be pleasantly surprised.

By Marisol Trowbridge

Photographs: Dan Meyers Photography

Visiting the Museum de Kantfabriek

What to do?

Downstairs:
• Take a tour of the museum and review the permanent exhibits covering the history of the lace museum and the town of Horst.
• Explore the temporary art exhibits. Current: “Kant en beweging” or “Sideways Moving”, an exhibit celebrating the ten-year anniversary of a group of lace making artists until October 24. Upcoming: “Landscape – Let Us Travel”, an exhibit of landscape embroidery.
• Visit the “atelier” where young artists and student artists have displays.
• Have a bite in the bright café. Recommended: the cappuccino and any of the tarts.
• Shop the crafts, art books, and gifts on offer.

Upstairs:
• Research the library, which houses the collection of The Dutch Center of Craft (NHC), including books covering subjects such as Dutch genealogy, crafts, textiles, garments, and of course, lace making.
• Attend a course or workshop in their large well-appointed classroom. Multi-session courses starting this fall will include quilt making, felting, screen-printing, embroidery and more. Upcoming one-day workshops include covering experimental textile, Spanish mantilla laces, and the Chinese Miao embroidery technique of the Dong women.

Visitor information:
Address: Americaanseweg 8, 5961GP Horst
Phone: 077 398 16 50
Entrance fee: 4 Euros per adult, or for groups of ten plus, 3.50 Euros
Hours: Tues-Sun 2-5pm
For more information see the website: http://www.museumdekantfabriek.nl