Two-Colour Shell Edging for a Towel No. 3169 (1916): vintage crochet pattern

Materials

• Size 30 mercerized cotton crochet thread — approximate; the book prints only its own trade name and size number
• Steel crochet hook
• Tapestry needle for the ends
• A second ball of size 30 thread in blue for the last row — the book names the colour only by its own number, 3010, which it calls light blue elsewhere in the same book
• A towel to work the edging into
• Hook: Start with a 1.25 mm (US steel 8) hook — approximate, and ours: the book prints “Crochet Hook, size 11”, a number on the maker's own scale that does not map onto modern steel sizes. Change size until the work lies flat.

Abbreviations (US terms)

ch

chain

sl st

slip stitch

sc

single crochet

dc

double crochet

sp

space

ch-sp

chain space

st

stitch

sts

stitches

sk

skip

ps

puff stitch

sh

shell

rep

repeat

row

row

Notes before you start

• Source: "No. 3169 — Towel Edging" (3169), Royal Society Crochet Lessons, Vol. 1, No. 7, H. E. Verran Company, Inc., New York, 1916. Public domain in the USA.
• As printed — materials: White CORDICHET, size 30, 1 ball; CORDICHET No. 3010, size 30, 1 ball; Crochet Hook, size 11; A towel to trim. Gauge: Not given.
• Modernisation note: Stitches are converted from the key this book prints itself, not from the date. The key is on book page 3, headed “CROCHET STITCHES”, facing a photographic plate of the same fifteen stitches on book page 2, and it defines every height in full. Single crochet is “insert needle in last chain and pull thread through, thus having two loops on needle. Wind thread once over needle and pull through the two loops” — the modern US single. Half double crochet is named and abbreviated separately, “wind thread once around needle, insert into chain and pull loop through. Wind thread around needle again and pull through three loops at once” — the modern US half double. Double crochet is “wind thread once around needle. Insert needle into chain and pull through; this leaves three loops on needle. Wind thread once around needle and pull through two. Wind thread again over needle and pull through two” — the modern US double, and because the book names the half double separately it cannot be the half double that Clark's 1923 book in another part of this library means by the same-looking abbreviation. Treble crochet is “made same way as Double Crochet, only at first wind thread twice over needle and pull thread through three times — two and two and two” — the modern US treble, written tr below; double treble takes three wraps and is written dtr. The key also defines the filet mesh as “chain two stitches, skip two stitches, one double crochet into next stitch” and a shell as “five double crochet in one stitch”. One trap in the printed abbreviation table on that page: it glosses “sp.” as spoke, not space, so no bare “sp.” anywhere in this book has been read as a space.
• Modernisation note: The book's wording is written in modern US form: “ch.” = ch; “s.c.” = sc; “h.d.c.” = hdc; “d.c.” = dc; “t.c.” and “tr.c.” = tr; “d.tr.c.” = dtr; “sl. st.” = sl st; “sk.” = sk; “p.” = picot; “m.” = mesh. Ordinal row names (“1st Row”, “2nd Row”) are written Row 1, Row 2; the book's “repeat from *” is written rep from *; and “finish off” is written fasten off. The book's own word “hole” for the gap it works into is kept, because that is the word it uses and it never abbreviates it.
• Modernisation note: The printed paragraphs are split into one row or step per line; stitch order and counts are unchanged. Section headings are the book's own where it prints them and ours where it does not. The OCR of this scan is rough — it prints “d.c.” variously as “dc”, “de” and “dic”, sets row labels as “lst Bow”, “Qnd Bow” and “8rd Row”, and drops words at the column breaks. Those quirks are kept in the excerpts and not in the rows.
• Modernisation note: The book names its threads by the maker's own trade name and colour number — Royal Society Cordichet in a stated size, sometimes with a colour number such as No. 3012. Those colour numbers were shade codes in the maker's own range and cannot be matched to any modern shade card, so they are recorded as printed and not converted. The stated thread size is read as roughly equal to the modern crochet cotton size of the same number — approximate only.
• Modernisation note: The book prints a hook number for most designs, but the number belongs to the maker's own scale rather than to any modern one, so it is recorded above as printed and the metric suggestion below is ours, read across from the thread size rather than from the page.
• Modernisation note: No gauge is printed for this design — the book prints no gauge, tension or stitch count per inch anywhere. Work a sample and change hook size until the piece lies flat.
• Modernisation note: Check: the first row is worked directly into the linen of the towel rather than into a foundation chain, so its stitch count is set by the towel and not printed. The book's own phrase is “into material”.
• Modernisation note: Check: this is a towel trimming, so its length is set by the towel it trims; the book prints no length and leaves the number of repeats to the worker.
• Modernisation note: No finished measurement is printed for this design.
• Modernisation note: No yardage is printed for this design. The book gives ball counts only, and where it does they are recorded above as printed; no length in yards or metres appears anywhere in the book.
• Modernisation note: Check: the picots are printed as a bare “1 p.” with no chain count, so they are left unnumbered above.
• Modernisation note: Check: the book names the second thread only as “CORDICHET No. 3010” with no colour word in the materials line, and then calls for it in Row 4 as “Blue cotton”. Both are the book's own and both are kept; the number is a shade code in the maker's own range and cannot be matched to a modern shade.
• Modernisation note: Check: the “BABY” lettering embroidered on the towel photographed with this edging on book page 42 is not part of this design and no directions are printed for it.
• Modernisation note: Check: every tall stitch in this design is the book's d.c., the modern US double crochet by the printed key.