Our Tutors

Kitty Mason

Kitty is a bobbin lace maker and teacher of lace, living in Edinburgh. Her background is in traditional lacemaking. Having learned on the English laces she then progressed to some of the Belgian laces and over more than 20 years has travelled regularly to Brugge for classes with Anne Marie Verbeke where she has also learned to interpret old patterns and design new ones. She particularly enjoys teaching Flanders lace and Binche lace.

However alongside her love of Binche lace she believes that lace should not always be white and flat and in her contemporary work loves to use colour, texture and some unusual materials. Using whatever techniques will achieve the desired effect Kitty uses many traditional techniques but also freer use of the threads. She enjoys the challenge of contemporary lace and one of her joys is helping students to develop their own contemporary lace working from their own inspirations and helping them to free their thinking and experiment. Scary but exciting! She is a member of the Westhope Group.

Frances Bell

Frances has been making lace since 1967. In 1984 she began teaching for Adult Education in East Yorkshire and then became a tutor for the York Lace Course, the Edinburgh Lace Course and several weekend courses. She teaches both English and Continental laces and enjoys a yearly trip to Brugge to learn from Anne Marie Verbeke Billiet.

Claire Bonito

Claire has been making bobbin lace since 1993, learning her craft initially under Pat Read MBE and later Jacquie Tinch. After gaining a good grounding in Torchon, Bedfordshire and Bucks Point laces she moved on to Milanese Lace and developed a real love for this style, as well as a flair for designing. Claire has developed her own recognisable signature contemporary style.

She has achieved a City and Guilds Certificate in Creative Lacemaking and has a Diploma in Teaching in the Lifelong Learning Sector. Claire has been teaching lace since the mid 2000s and does so in a range of settings across the UK. She quickly gained a reputation for her open and easy manner and for being an excellent communicator with all levels of lacemaker, her classes and courses are always popular.

Claire has created an impressive collection of lace designs. The majority are worked in Modern Milanese using a selection of Milanese and Withof techniques, there is also a smaller selection of primarily Torchon designs. All her designs are available to purchase online from www.roseground.com

Some of Claire’s designs are backed up with a range of YouTube videos on her “Bonitocrafts” channel

Carole Smith

Carole has been making lace since the age of ten and over the years has made a variety of bobbin laces. She has been taught by Kitty Mason and a number of tutors when they visited Aberdeen including Pamela Nottingham and Veronica Sorensen. Since 2001 Carole has been part of Kitty’s trip to Brugge to be taught by both Anne-Marie Verbeke-Billiet and Magda Mallise focussing on making and designing Flemish Laces.

In recent years, Carole has taught in Aberdeen, Inverness and Nairn and from 2014 has been a regular at the Edinburgh Lace Course.