Bluestockings (Kate Davies)

Bluestockings

edited by Kate Davies and Nicole Pohl

This beautiful new offerinbg, coedited by Kate Davies and Nicole Pohl, brings together a celebration of the eighteenth-century learned women known as the Bluestockings, with a wide-ranging exploration of sock and stocking knitting. Bluestocking's first section features different perspectives on the history of socks and stockings, from expert contributors like Susan North (curator of eighteenth-century fashion at the V&A) and Sonja Barjielowska (of John Arbon worsted spinners). The book’s second section includes essays about creative eighteenth-century women such as Mary Delany and Phillis Wheatley Peters, accompanied by contemporary toe-up patterns for socks and stockings. Among our Bluestocking-inspired designs you’ll find openwork and texture, stripes, chevrons, stranded colorwork, and a go-to sock and stocking recipe named for talented eighteenth-century classicist (and knitter) Elizabeth Carter. Lavishly illustrated, this volume offers an exciting in-the-round combination of material history, contemporary making, and early feminism from contributors Sonja Bargielowska, Kate Davies, Kristina Decker, Elizabeth Eger, Susan North, Nicole Pohl, and Isabella Whitworth.