IT’S NO coincidence that many of the early knitting manual writers were the owners of yarn shops, or ‘wool warehouses’ as they were then called. The doyenne of all early Victorian knitting manual writers was Edinburgh’s Jane Gaugain (c. 1800 - 1860).
Jane and her husband ran a chain of wool warehouses, with their flagship shop on George Street, Edinburgh. Jane’s book, Lady’s Assistant in Knitting, Netting and Crochet (1840) was to become the world’s best-selling knitting receipt (recipe) book, and went into over twenty editions worldwide.
This influential writer was born Jane Allison, the daughter of a tailor, in Edinburgh. In 1826, Jane married J.J. Gaugain, an importer of fancy goods, and “dealer in foreign lace” originally trading in Blackfriars, London.
Knitting in fashion
Until the advent of published…
