It's beautiful. i would hand wash in in the bathtub, but i would enquire with others more knowledgeable with soaps to use. Rinse well, squeeze dry and roll in towels. Then lay flat to dry, best would be on a sheet ourdoors in sunshine.

There's a couple things you could do. Considering age and the pic, I'm guessing tha's 100% cotton. Is that actually ecru, or is that a white that is aged to darkness? You could see if you have a local cleaner that cleans old things. Check with a local museum that displays fabric goods if the yellow pages isn't helpful. Good cleaners that can do vintage well are harder to find than a decade or so ago.

Is there any damage to it? Holes, loose threads, ect. If you don't know, check it over before anything else. Since it's a big piece, I wouldn't put it into the washer. Or dryer. I woulld give it a gentle hand wash in the tub. The towel roll it for wringing. I would dry it spread out over a pair of clothes lines, or spread out flat on absorbent material. Helps with some of the wrinklng. There will be some wrinkling.

If it needs washing, you want to soak it for a long time with mild soap. Soaking for 24 hours can be useful. You can put a mild soap on any spots.

If you have a dining room table that isn't used often, you can put the bedspread on the table to display it and whip it off before anyone does anything remotely messy (like serving dinner) anywhere near it. Of course, that depends on the extent to which it is stretchy. It looks knitted and some yarns will stretch out of shape on a table, others won't.

I've inherited a lot of stuff that sat in my parents's attic, too precious to be used. It was just a waste. Use it. If it wears out, it wears out. Whoever made it would probably prefer it to be used, loved and eventually worn out and discarded than sitting in a box or closet rarely seen. I know I'd rather anything I make be used and loved than hoarded in a closet as too precious.

I'm glad you want to preserve this. I once saw a similar item and was told that it had taken the maker several years to complete, so it represents a huge effort on your great great's part.

I like the idea of using it as a show tablecloth.

I have scads of this old crochet that I have inherited from numerous ancestors. It is the same thread crochet as yours.

I have tried and tried to find some way to display or use it and have come up short on ideas, completely.

I have a large suitcase filled with this! plus a big stack of depression era quilts.

It is a shame to simply store it. but the reality is that it has been stored since it was finished becasue there is really no practical use for it, ever. Most of my ancestors did not have fancy homes with unused bedroom or formal dining rooms.

I have so much and so does my sister. We both ended up with stacks of quilts and lots of these huge table cloths and bed spreads and none of it really useful for anything.

But all it has ever been is stored away to preserve it. Preserve it for WHAT? WHO? WHY?

Most of this is mid century, give or take a few years.

I have a theory about why there is so much of it made by ladies of that time.

My theory is that this is a generation that is coming out of the depression, just entered adulthood and the world war happened. They have been through a lot and now the war is over, those who survived have returned home and they are beginning to fill up the new burbs around the cities and they marry, start a family and buy a new house. So, they are aspiring towards making such fancy and lacy things for the new home and are emnbracing an old aesthetic of ornate things. So they make these overly ornate things, show them off to friends and neighbors. put them on the table or the bed one time or two, then put them away to preserve and keep them nice for futture generations. And, here we are, with lots of this stuff and nothing to do but continue to store it just as they did.. I know for a fact that this is the story of what I have.

Then along came television and the ladies of that time were a bit older and maybe are needing now to wear glasses for close work. So , they switch to crocheting granny squares while watching Ed Sullivan, and Lucy.

The one thing that my mom made that we still use to this day are the afghans that she knitted, not crocheted. I am using one at this very moment. They are useful and enduring and not hard to care for. This was more from the 70s.

I still have my hubs grandmorhers steel hooks. I have even done a bit of this thread crochet, myself.

I got the suitcase out again just this week to take a second thought about what to do with it. I pulled out a few small pieces that I am going to freecycle. I put the rest back in the suitcase and have no better idea than that. But if all it is stored somewhere out of sight, it might as well just not be at all.

My sister has a rural cabin second house and she will take things out there and build a fire and burn them. She burned some of the quilts and she burned our brothers military things as he had no children. She burns them with respect. The alternaive of the trash heap just seems

disrespectful.

These crocheted pieces and hundred year old quilts will just rot away. And they smell of old decaying fabric and are of no real use, at all.

No one's kids want any of this stuff, and, honestly it is getting pretty old.

I dont know what to do with it either other than burning it. Sister told me to ship it to her and she would put in the fire.

I did take some crochet edgings and put them on pillowcases that I made and I really do use them. But that is just the edging . The pillow case is new cotton.

They are just a plant fiber and they have a limited life time until they just dry rot. That is why there are so few historical textiles. It wont last forever and they just rot away.

Forever just stored and never used? I ask myself why. Yet I still do, for now.

They are big, beautiful and useless and beginning to go the way of vintage textiles. I dont think you can get the decaying odor out of them. I used to have them in a cedar chest and they always smelled of cedar and I didnt like that. So i got rid of the chest, too. It was always awkward and in the way,so out it went to freecycle. I have not regretted it, not once.

I dont want things stored and never seen.

I hope to do make them go away before the kids have to clean it all out. What are they ever going to do with a bunch of rotting textiles? My son will be comfortable with just trashing them, but my daughter will feel compelled to keep them in her house that is already bulging at the seams with other useless stuff!

Yeah, a lot of people don't know what to do with the makings of yesterdays. If it is smelling sour or rotten, it's because it's stored wrong. Might not have been cleaned well before storage. Natural fibers rot in ways that more modern plastic blend weaves don't. The lace and weave patterns aren't popular now, like a lot of other needlework home goods aren't as popular now.

I have a small box of makings too. I use them sometimes as the little table toppers. A few are rather fine and useful in my wardrobe. A few have been worked into clothing or accessories. It feels kind of painful to cut them up, but sometimes it's better to cut and use rather than not.

I have a couple of tablecloths and runners, and those I use as tablecloths and runners on occasion. Right now I have a cream one that is sheer with embroidery and some hardanger on the table.

But then, it's my style. I hit a point of what's the point of storage and started using it. My parents wedding silver, gmas wedding crystal, ggmas china from the old country. Used as much as my dollar store soup bowls. As old embroidered napkins and towels finally die to the rag bin, I make new ones. 've got a couple good local places to donate to if I don't know what to do with old stuff, and that helps too. It sells for them. Haven't buned anything yet... but I have a couple borders out back that have a lot of old natural fibers as a layer.

Should you want to display it on a table, I've seen these heirlooms covered with plastic. The kids and grandkids can still eat at the table while you tell them about the person who made this treasure. They will remember........it's a family thing.

I dont want to be the keeper of these things. Only myself and my sister are the ones who have preserved anything . Things just fell to us and we caught them because no one else was reaching for it. We have both inhertied things from our husband's families, too, and they are more of the same large crocheted pieces and assorted "treasures" from the depression era on up.

I am now down to the textiles, mostly .

None of our kids want any of it.

If it was actually useful in some way that would be different. I can, and do, use the afghans. But the thread crochet was a fantasy that our mothers and grandmothers had of a life that never really existed, for my family. No one ever had a dining room or an impressively decorative bedroom for show. That was a fantasy.

beesneeds, I understand that it does take some measures to store old things, but mostly they just co exiisted with everything else in the house. some of the quilts are almost 100 years old and they have cotton batting in them They smell of decay. And some of the thread crochet had dry rottted. I am not willing to invest in resources to preserve these old textiles. Preserve and keep for who? Already no one wants them. And I wont last forever, either. I find it interesting that you also have buried old textiles or so I do think that is what you said.

My then neighbors were from Iraq and they did not know what to think of me out there burying old fabric in the ground, and with the language barrier it was hard to explain. It was a concept totally out of their view of life..

One thing that I am glad that I spoke up for was photos from hubs Italian grandmother. Had I not asked her for some photos , none would have survived from that family. Her daughter, my MIL, threw away all of her photos when she died! The only ones that survived are the ones that I have.

Yes, I do bury natural fiber textiles. Usually between cardboard layers in a smother bed out back. I've only done it a couple times. Sometimes an old textile is just shot. It's compostable, but I'm not breaking it up to put it in a bin, heh. My bins are slow, but not that slow. I have a small pile of mostly scrap accumulating now for a berm project. I have actually burned some scrap. I use natural fiber to wipe and clean during candle making, and those are used as firestarters for the firepit. Smell isn't always the best, but works great. Another old what to do with it is fur. Many places don't resell it. A couple old ones of mine that hit shedding point became bedding in the outdoor cat house. Some animal shelters/rescues take them.

If you got stuff that is bad... rotted, decaying, got holes that just are not worth even crafting around. Then yeah, get rid of it. Out the door to the berms, beds, firepits. If one can do those things. Or trash if necessary. If it's nice and there's a good resale near, donate it.

I'm all for using the things I got rather than packing away. I'm preserving these things for me to use. I would use the OP's piece on a bed, a tablecloth, a summer throw on the couch. Depending on the overall pattern on it, it could potentally become a top or shawl sort of piece.

Why not lay it across the bottom of a guest bed - you seem semi-interested. What is the unlikely part?

About using it: Do you think it would survive a trip in the washer on the Gentle or Handwash cycle? Sometimes you can encase things in a big zippered pillow cover or a giant net bag. Sometimes things are ready to disintegrate.

If it's too delicate to wash, then I suggest giving it away, perhaps with a note about its maker and its history. You can ask the local historical society if they want it.

Please post an update when you have decided what to do.

I'd hand wash it in a bath tub, not send it through a washing machine. If it's soiled, I'd soak it for a good 24 hours and use a mild soap on the spots. Lie it flat to dry.

Holidays coming fast, I’ll wait till after to tackle it…in a tub wash.

kendrah, I realized the guest beds are too often used by grandchildren and their friends to be practical . To be continurd…

bees....you said that you are preserving it for yourself, but do you really use it? You say you "would", and you say that it "could", but you dont say that you do. So are you just keeping and storing it as I am? Are you waiting for some other time and place to use them? Do you actually have pieces like this?

I have lots of it!

What I have is not full of holes and if a piece crocheted from cotton is falling in one spot, the rest of it is going the same way so there is no repairing going on. It is old textiles where some are from the early part of the 20th century. Some of the thread crochet is getting brittle. The old quilts are all still intact, but still old. Old natural fibers just rot away, eventually. And, in the meantime they will off gas and take on a smell of "old".

And, I have so much of it! None of it is compatable with our stream lined modern lifestyle. I have no little table to dress with little doilies or extra bedroom to decorate. I just dont live like that and our families never did, either. No one ever had a formal dining room, either.

I have at times folded and hung several pieces over an opening that looks down to the living room. But, then they get dust and dirt that settles on them from the HVAC and the rising fumes of the kitchen and, honestly, there is realy no one else comes in here much anymore to even see them. And. all the time in the past when I did have them on display not one person was ever interested enough in them to ask about them. No one was even noticing or curious about them.

I certainly wont go to any extent to preserve when no one even wants them and there is no way to stop the passing of time wherein all that is carbon based will decompose, including me

My moms thread crochet is probalby no older than the 60s and a couple of her quilts are no older than that . Her quilts were more about utility than anything else.

I recently took a quilt that is the wedding ring design and trimmed and rebound the edges to make them straight. It is full of hand stitches and she used a basic white on the back. So, I just use it with the white quilted side up. All of those little quilting stithces mean something to me, like the hand of my mom on me. So that is the extent what I use.

I just this week put it through a gentle machine wash.

It is not as if mine are stored somewhere musty or wet or anything like that. They are just old and the cotton is breaking down as do all historical textiles that are not carefully preserved. My house is where I live. I have no facilties for textile preservation in my home.

Yes, I already said I use the things I have, or what I do with what I don't or won't use. The could or would is about the OP's piece.

It's a lovely piece and in the picture above I don't see any evidence of holes or deterioration. More will be known after a gentle bath soak. Display it and enjoy it.

If you use it on a table put a bright color tablecloth under it. Like a red for Christmas!

What a beautiful Christmas tablecloth that would be! With a red cloth underneath and maybe some tartan runners?