Letter from Paris
All Dolled Up (Part Two)
Dear friends,
Before all else, I thank you for the piles of supportive comments that followed last month’s letter. In a tough world, words of kindness are never to be taken for granted.
And I’m happy you didn’t mind reading about the vintage doll project for the holiday windows at Les Tricoteurs Volants because I have more to say about it today.
Although there are many more pressing knitting projects on the docket, the first outfit for Marianne* (the shop owner has decided that’s her name) keeps distracting me.
I thought I’d knock it out quickly in a couple of afternoons. The pattern, from the 1947 book J’apprends à tricoter pour habiller Primevere, ma poupée (I Learn to Knit to Dress Primrose, My Doll) was intended as a learning manual for a child. It’s all garter stitch, worked flat. A bunch of rectangles with minimal shaping.
While knitting the rectangles, I thought about the original audience for the book. Of course it is aimed explicitly at the jeune Française, the young French girl, who is pictured on the cover studiously turning out a doll scarf with needles as long as her forearms.
As soon as you open the cover, though, the authors address the other audience: les mamans. The moms.
In the Petite Préface, author Eliane Lamarque writes,
Knitting isn’t learned from books, like the alphabet, grammar, or the history of France. Little girls learn to knit on their own, so long as their mothers have the time and patience to show them how to begin. The speed at which they progress is therefore a matter of instruction. In dedicating this book to little French girls, we have simply wished to offer mothers and teachers a practical method for acquainting children with wool and needles.
There it is. The book is for the daughter, the I of I Learn to Knit, but mother’s participation will be required.
Her immediate participation. The first step of the first lesson is, “Ask maman to cast on ten stitches (you will learn later to do it yourself).” Again and again, throughout, maman’s intervention is required to lift the new knitter over this obstacle or that. Maman will cast on, maman will bind off, maman will do blah blah blah, go ask maman.
When the book was published, maman would have been part of a generation in which needlework, including knitting, was still part of the French public school curriculum for girls.** It was reasonable to assume that she would know how to knit. It was another thing to assume she enjoyed it, was any good at it, or was inclined to teach it.
We must hope that all three were true, because even for me the book is a real head-scratcher in many places–starting with the cast on.
I’ve been a professional knitter for almost two decades. I’ve spent many a cozy hour with learned colleagues, playing with cast-ons common and exotic, ancient and modern, foreign and domestic. I have never in my life run across the one in the book, a misbegotten spawn of the knitted and long tail methods. It is best worked with three hands, and the result after much swearing and sweating is remarkably ugly.
The patterns–which, please remember, are supposed to introduce children to the joys of knitting–are surprisingly fiddly. The ties for the bolero, for example. They’re worked in the same three-color stripe pattern as the skirt.
The color order for these stripes is such that you must either cut and re-join your working yarns after almost every stripe; or carry all three yarns along the entire right edge of each tie. If you want neat edges, you will have to weave in a lot of ends. But the book doesn’t tell you how to weave in ends. Go ask maman.
The book also doesn’t tell you how long the ties should be. It tells you to sew them on, one of many times sewing is required. Yet it never explains how to sew pieces together. Go ask maman.
Still, I pressed on as directed. I do love working from historic patterns, for better or worse, and I try to stay faithful. The results were…uh…
The drawstring waist? The weird, bulky bow?
Okay, listen. This would be fine in the milieu for which it was designed: the nursery. You wear this outfit to a tea party where the hostess is seven years old and all the other guests are stuffed animals? No problem.
For a boutique window in a world fashion capital? Hell no.
I have therefore decided to continue in the spirit of a different sort of maman. This maman likes knitting, and bought J’apprends à tricoter hoping it would encourage la petite Aurélie to do likewise. Aurélie did four raggedy rows of the first exercise before losing interest. The expensive new doll is sprawled across the settee, brioche crumbs in her hair, naked except for one sock. The yarn, needles, and book have been hidden under the cushion in the dog’s basket.
Maman picks up the lot and gets to work. She is only a few steps in before she begins to make changes. A drawstring waist? Non. Non. Not in this house, mon dieu.
So I, channeling this hypothetical mid-century French knitter, am using the original patterns only as a point of departure. There has been much ripping and remodeling.
First: Marianne’s bolero now closes with hooks hidden behind a little bow of more suitable proportions.
Second: Her skirt is now gathered into an actual waistband (lined with woven fabric so it won’t stretch). It buttons in the back.
And she has a pink beret, entirely my own improvisation, to top it all off.
Once I add a blouse, this will do nicely.*** It’s been a genuine pleasure to make, too. That’s good, because Marianne has a sister on the way from a doll dealer in Amsterdam.
I had no choice. Les Tricoteurs Volants has big windows.
Cordialement,
Franklin
*A name she shares with the female figure who serves as a symbol and embodiment of the French nation.
**Except in small villages, most French public elementary schools were segregated by gender until the 1960s. Ten years after the publication of J’apprends à tricoter, only 30% of French elementary schools included both boys and girls. Co-education was introduced at different times and places across the nation until it became compulsory in 1975.
***I promise to send you photos of Marianne in her finished ensemble when we unveil the holiday windows.
Thank goodness that you looked out for poor Marianne, Franklin! That ensemble was rather frightening in its original version. A little too Côte d’Azur and not suitable for a display window.
I’m looking forward to the completed window, as it is bringing back memories of the holiday toy displays in the department store of my childhood (J.L. Hudson’s, in Detroit).
This is so much fun!! Thank you for sharing, Franklin!!!
Franlklin–as always, witty and wise! J’aime the changes you made!
I predict this window will be a huge hit, with grandmothers, mothers and daughters of all ages admiring the dolls, the outfits and sharing stories of their own dolls. It’s such a fundamental part of girlhood for so many women – what a great project. I can’t wait to see the finished result.
Oh my, what a way to make knitting no fun! Not all mamans like knitting for sure. My maman knit exactly one pale green sweater and matching hat with some intricate texture when she was pregnant with me. I know because I dressed my dolls with it. I learned to knit in a Quaker co-ed class in the 4th grade, a bright red hat being the result. Also got a “boyfriend” with whom we bombed enemy toy soldiers from his back porch with rocks. But we never knit together, tant pis.
Oh, Franklin, you have outdone yourself with this one! I chuckled several times. You are a source of delight in these difficult times. Thank you!
The beret is the very best! Good going.
I love her outfit and your interpretation is wonderful!
That tie is a bit much. All those color changes will make the first stitches stretched out and easy to accidentally drop. It’s like they want kids to hate knitting early so they’ll buy store-bought.
‘Give the saggy, fiddly mess to Mamam and ask her to weave in the ends. Bring her a nice glass of wine. When she starts swearing, bring her the entire bottle.’
Thank you for a trip down Memory Lane. For me, the doll was Barbie, and the knitting was one of those circular looms. My Barbie wore several knit sheaths for several years.
You would be a lovely Maman. Your interpretation of Marianne’s outfit is tres jolie!
Enjoying this journey thoroughly…thanks for taking us along!!
I remember that in 1968 my school had to be mixte (boys and girls). But the directeur was horrified. So we had boys and girls BUT in different classrooms, and the récréations were alternate. HA! He thought he was clever.
Love the smiles and chuckles you bring to my morning coffee. Not to mention the delightful final interpretation of Marianne’s outfit.
Ah! The care, the details, the chic. The fabric lining so the waistband won’t get stretched out – made me smile. You instinctively know the goal, Franklin. Not really “doll clothes” but clothes. Doll-sized, perhaps today. But still with an eye to form and function. Very cool.
Your changes to the pattern are definitely beneficial to the entire design element. The clothing now has panache. What child could turn down such gorgeously constructed clothes for their petite doll?
Perhaps writing a leaflet with these beauties is in your future?
Oh what a joy!
If I were able to knit your first rendition, I would be quite proud.
Back to the cowls and hats.
I love the doll stories! And your interpretation is FAR better. Can‘t wait to see how she turns out!
The outfit you made for Marianne is so much cuter than the one the 1947 maman made!!!
I love your letters from Paris.
Thank-you!
You have vastly improved Marianne’s wardrobe.
I look forward to meeting her “sister”.
Perhaps because my own ‘maman’ needed to do my casting on and binding off (and perhaps did not demonstrate it well because at 9ish I never got the hang of it) I lost interest in knitting then like the girl in your example and it took me until a writer triggered my interest and it became my pandemic obsession almost 50 years later! Wise choices in the redesign!
It seems like Marianne was the permission slip for MORE DOLLS. Her outfit is the cutest. Bon chic bon genre!
Reality triumphed- a mama w/ brains and no piddly need to follow some lost ramblings of reduction to absurdity! Thanks for giving mama a boost! And the doll some fashion savvy.
What a delight to read, something simple made so hard long ago. You have triumphed. Look forward to the ensemble. Xxx
Oh, I love that this story continues!! Your changes are perfect (and much needed), and I’m looking forward to seeing more!