Small-scale Venetian needle laces of the late seventeenth century, called point de neige, were well suited to fashions of the period, which required that lace be gatherable at the neck and sleeves. The name point de neige refers to the resemblance of the delicate buttonholed loops and projecting picots to snowflakes (neige being the French word for snow). The later nineteenth century witnessed an extensive industry in both the copying and remodeling of seventeenth- and eighteenthcentury laces. This piece reflects that trend, as it incorporates older elements into a nineteenth-century collar.
