VINCIOLO, Federico de. Les Singuliers et nouveaux pourtraicts du seigneur Federic de Vinciolo Venitien, pour toutes sortes d’ouvrages de Lingerie. Dédié à la Reyne. Derechef et pour la quatrième fois augmentez, outre le reseau premier & le point couppé & lacis, de plusieurs beaux & différens portraits de réseau de point conté, avec le nombre de mailles, chose non encore veue ni inventée. [Suivi de : ] Les Secondes Œuvres, et subtiles inventions de Lingerie du Seigneur Federic de Vinçiolo Venitien ; Nouvellement augmenté de plusieurs carrez de point de rebort. Dédiées à Madame, Sœur unique du roy. Ou sont représentées plusieurs figures de réseau, nombres de Carrez & Bordures tous différents, le tout de poinct conté, avec autres sortes de carrez de nouvelle invention non encore veus.

Rare work of models of lace and embroidery, “curious and becoming rare” (Brunet) in ancient binding with beautiful margins.

Reunion of the first and second models for ladies, with a total of 216 woodcuts.

* Les Singvliers et nouveaux povrtraicts, 1589 :

First “Thurin” edition, following the first published in Paris two years earlier, in 1587: the work was a great success, with three editions appearing in the same year. Dedication to the Queen dated 12 July 1589 (King Henri III was assassinated the following month).

It contains 106 wooden models of lace and embroidery.

– First part: title with beautiful frame, portrait of Henri III, portrait of Louise de Lorraine, sonnet (“Aux dammes et dammoiselles“), 37 woodcuts (out of 39) on the front leaves, blank leaf.

– Second part: title framed differently from the previous one, 69 woodcuts on the recto and verso, framed with olive branches on the last leaf (taken from that of the opening royal portraits); writing on the verso of this last leaf: “bonne long serour long / que vos faicts dans vos / Monsieur Je ne ser le souget de votre / pour finir faut fair / bone / bonne” with a large “Nostradamus” signature.

*Les Secondes Oeuvres, et subtiles inventions de Lingerie… Paris, Jean Le Clerc, 1601 :

Title with framing, Letter to the reader, Letter to the king’s sister (Catherine de Bourbon), two sonnets, privilege, 110 woodcuts (including 12 on the front leaves alone), Discours du Lacis (3 ff.).

Third edition, according to Arthur Lotz, who dates the first to 1593 or 1594 and states that this one is probably similar to the previous one; Lozt never seems to have been able to consult the present edition.

Originally from Venice, the art of lacemaking appeared in France under François I. Although lace was the preserve of men, it soon appealed to women too: Catherine de Médicis wanted to add it to her toiletries.

The Venetian Federic [sic] de Vinciolo, who settled in France after Catherine de Médicis, was granted a monopoly on the manufacture of lace collars in France. His embroidery and lace designs were a great success.

“One of the first designers to be thus credited and celebrated was Federico de Vinciolo, a Venetian who was purportedly brought to France by Queen Catherine de’ Medici herself. The admiration for his skill as a maker of reticella (cutwork), lacis (darned netting), and lace was so great that he was given the exclusive right in France to fashion reticella collars, which were immensely popular at the time. Similarly, the pattern books with his designs, first published by Jean Leclerc in 1587, sold like hotcakes. Three editions were issued in the first year alone, reprints were made uninterruptedly in Paris until 1612, and copies were produced in Turin, Lyon, Strasbourg, Basel, and Montbéliard. The publication of Vinciolo’s book followed shortly after a new edition of Domenico da Sera’s pattern designs, and the popularity of the two works is illustrated by the incorporation of motifs from both books in a French altar cloth of the late sixteenth century. […] Vinciolo was one of the first to represent his patterns in white on a dark ground, printing a silhouette of the pattern instead of the pattern itself. For that reason, some of his more freely drawn patterns for lacis seem to resemble cut-paper work more than textile patterns.” (Fashion & Virtue, p. 37-36).

« The editions of Vinciolo represented in the Hofer collection are those of Turin, Eleazaro Thomysi, 1589 (probably fictitious imprint), Strasbourg, Bernhard Jobin, 1592 (German title), Lyons, Leonard Odet, 1603, and Paris, Le Clerc, 1612 (HCL except for 1592). Also in the Hofer collection (HCL) is the first edition of Matthias Mignerak’s La pratique de l’aiguille industrieuse, printed by Jean Le Clerc in 1605 with an engraved title-page designed by Pierre Firens. On the Vinciolo patterns, see further, Lotz, p. 190-195 (reproduction plates 76-79). A London edition of Vinciolo was entered in the Stationer’s Register by John Wolfe in 1587, but no copy of such an edition has been located. A different lace book was printed by Wolfe with Edward White in 1591 under the similar title of New and singular patternes and workes of linnen, with a dedication signed by Adrian Poyntz (S.T.C. 20180). There are, however, traces of Wolfe’s projected Vinciolo. Copies of the Paris title-border and laurel wreath are found in later English boks, the border, in the Eton Chrysostom of 1610 and te wreath in the Philemon Holland Livy of 1600 (full citations under Nos. 216, 101 ; see W. A. Jackson’s description of the Livy in the Pforzheimer catalogue, op. cit. No. 101, vol. 2, n° 495). The Livy was printed by Adam Islip, who took over much of Wolfe’s type and ornaments after 1593 (H. R. Hoppe, « John Wolfe, printer and publisher, 1579-1601 », « The library, fourth series, vol. 14, 1933‑1934, p. 267). » (Harvard. French 546).

Volumes of embroidery and lace from the 16^th century are sought after.

Provenance: handwritten ex-libris “Bordia” on the title of the second volume.

References: Lotz, Bibliographie der Modelbücher, 111b eet 128d; Fashion & Virtue: Textile Patterns and the Print Revolution, 1520-1620, New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, 2015, v. 73, no. 2, p. 36-37.