Designs by Marjory Tillotson

I wrote in February (here) about small collection of a dozen booklets and leaflets from the 1920s, that I had just been sent for the Knitting & Crochet Guild's collection.  Most of them were completely new to me.  They deserve to be shown in more detail, so here are a few of them, designed by Marjory Tillotson. 

She designed the earliest pattern booklets that were published in this country, for J. & J. Baldwin & Partners, of Halifax.  The first 'Beehive Knitting Booklets' appeared in about 1910, and Marjory Tillotson stopped working for the company in 1920 when she married.  But some of the booklets she designed evidently stayed in print for several years, or were reissued in a 'New & Enlarged Edition'.  All the ones I am showing here date from the 1920s, by which time the company was part of Patons & Baldwins Limited.

Beehive Booklet no. 13

The first booklet (no. 13) has a dozen designs for babies' garments - although it's called a Beehive Knitting Booklet, they are all crochet patterns.  An impressive array of bonnets, caps, coats, and bootees, all trimmed with satin ribbon bows, even those for boys.  

The second booklet (no. 14) has a range of sports sweaters, for women and men, girls and boys.

Beehive Booklet no. 14

The cover shows a woman wearing her sports sweater to play tennis, but I think that sports sweaters were often worn as casual wear and not just for sports.  (As sports wear is now, in fact.)

From Beehive Booklet no. 14

The booklet includes sweaters for Girl Guides and Boy Scouts, and says that both are the regulation pattern.   'Each Girl Guide should knit one of these sweaters.  It is of the regulation pattern, easy to make and neat, warm and durable in wear.'  (Boy Scouts were not, of course, expected to knit their sweaters.)

Booklet 16 has patterns for nine 'House Wraps' - a range of garments to wear at home, including bed-jackets.

Beehive Booklet no. 16 

The cover design, 'Florence', is a knitted nightingale - a type of bed wrap invented by Florence Nightingale.  They were designed to be very easy to make from a length of woollen fabric (see here),  and many nightingales were made for the sick and wounded during the First World War.  Marjory Tillotson replicated the design in knitting. The booklet describes its construction: 'The graceful "FLORENCE" Wrap is made in one length (in a fancy knitted pattern) like a shawl, the collar being formed by turning back the two corners of a slit-like opening in one of the long sides.'  The making up instructions say: 'For the cuffs, turn back the corners of the long side opposite the collar, folding them over and fastening at the folded points while leaving sufficient room through which to pass the hands.  Finish off with dainty bows.'

Another design I'm quite taken with is Cicely - mainly because it's called a Breakfast Jacket, and it seems such a ridiculous idea to have a special garment to have breakfast in.

From Beehive Booklet no. 16

It's also completely impractical - the sleeves are very loose with big frilly cuffs, and they would trail in your Weetabix or bacon and eggs. But perhaps you could eat a light breakfast of tea and toast (if someone else buttered it for you) without getting  in a terrible mess.

Finally, there is a booklet of vests, plain and ribbed. There are patterns for women, men and children, from size 22in. chest upwards.  Not very exciting designs, but the illustration in the front cover is charming.

\Beehive Booklet no. 25

Although Marjory Tillotson could not work for Patons and Baldwins after she married, she did continue to design knitting patterns for other companies, until well after the Second World War.  She also wrote books on knitting, including The Complete Knitting Book.  It's wonderful to have these very early booklets, with her name prominently displayed on the cover - I think they are now very scarce, and it's amazing that these copies have survived in such good condition.
 

J. & J. Baldwin's trade mark, from Beehive Booklet no. 25