Louise McCrady named her rag rug technique ShiRReT in 1968 and this is a history herstory of its evolution..

She named it ShiRRéT and this is Herstory.

My mom and grandmother created practical beauty from humble materials.
They created the word ShiRRéT™.
They wrote patterns and taught in the Midwest and New England starting in the 1920's.

I'm LOUISE McCRADY's daughter, a NY painter.
I am curator, expert + archivist of Louise's life work in ShiRRéT American tapestry crochet, from the recent 86 years of my family. My children and I are the third and fourth generations of ShiRRéT. This is the ShiRRéT public archive. Louise made many of the carpets on this site.

YOUR ShiRReT STORIES

Send a photo of your ShiRReT

Art historically, Shirret descends from ancient French and English tapestries. The scale of a Shirret tapestry stitch is (– so American ) gargantuan ! by comparison.

The subject of ShiRReT is not different from the geometric symbols of American quilts, lent meaning by connections to holidays and family rituals. The thousands of people who make these rare and beautiful American Art Tapestries put stories into their Shirret with every bit of fabric they use, clothing remnants from family members.

1920's Katherine Hart Ent Benson >
1960's Louise Benson McCrady >
1990's+ Louise's daughter Lady McCrady and grandchildren Lovis and Juliet

Louise McCrady learned this rag rug technique for turning scraps into gold from her mom. ShiRRéT is alchemy from the 1920's Depression "Waste not, want not".

Louise and her mother started teaching it in the late 1920's in Indiana and Ohio. In 1968 she began teaching in Connecticut, all New England, New Jersey and New York to thousands of people. We show ShiRRéT at the NewYork State Sheep and Wool festival in October.

Shirret™ is a meditative activity. Like gardening, baking or knitting it summons physical and philosophical riches to share with family and friends.

Shirret™ is an artistic form that tells about the time and culture we live in.

To Shirret™ is to be actively thoughtful of the environment by working constructively with hands and mind to create warmth, kindness and beauty.

With support from Louise's friends around
the country we continue her intentions:
to beautify and inspire sustainability, creative thought and productive, intelligent action.

HerStory

When my orange haired toddlers celebrated Lulu's 78th birthday in her favorite way - with pink food, a fairy cake and a magic wand - she told us again the story of Addie Hart in Indianapolis.

(Kurt Vonnegut says Indianapolis was designed by Hausmann, the architect of etoile Paris.)
As a girl living in a cabin in what is now the downtown 'star' where the Indiana State House stands, Addie listened to the wolves in the moonlight.

Addie's parents were from Ireland. German Joseph Ent and she had 6 girls and 6 boys. Celtic storytelling, singing and dancing came from their mother and stern practicality came from their father. The girls had nimble fingers for needlework - and folding and pinning new shirts in the shirt factory. The 6 boys were builders and inventers. "And", Lulu said, "EVERYONE had red hair !"

I can see the cabbage rose and polka dot fine American cotton from the shirt factory in Katy's rugs. The strips are 3/4 inch, gathered and crocheted in the middle.
Katrine Ent, my grandmother, was born in 1892. She told me that people made these rugs before the Civil War. There was a shortage of steel from the war - no more needles - and the technique died out.

Katrine's rag rug experiments in the 1920's had her ripping out and redoing many rows at a time! Without the right numbers of stitches, the rugs could ruffle or cup instead of laying flat so she wrote patterns. Bringing her 18 year old daughter Louise, my grandmother distributed needles and patterns through L.S. Ayres department store,
Indianapolis and Dayton Ohio.

Is crochet from fishing net-making? It is Irish-German-African-Polish-Caribbean-French-Mexican-Lebanese-Persian-Native-Latina-Native-Japanese-Canadian American. My friend - colleague Paula Gabriel (it means angel) thinks ShiRRéT is crocheted because our foremother didn't have a loom to weave the fabric scraps.

In the 1950's, Louise took her gaily colored handmade rugs up the road to a horse meet in Cheshire. She had improved the method, and used fabric from the wool mohair Chanel suits she made for herself. Her rugs were LUXE.

She named the method "ShiRRéT". She called a stitch with a fold a " Shirret stitch". She called the fabric on the needle "folds", which eliminated the need to sew any scraps together, and tiny scraps could be used easily. And instead of taking extra stitches to increase as crochet does, she simply took an extra fold off the needle. The old style of fabric crochet was unreliable. Louise wrote her REPEATABLE FORMULAS into patterns.

Her first book in 1968 was called Creative Rugcraft. She sold Shirret at craft fairs and mail order in magazines. Twenty friends taught it. We designed new patterns for magazines. Now you find Shirret all over the US.

Louise's shirret is included in A New Look At Crochet by Elyse Sommer 1973, The Teenager's Guide to Hobbies for Here and Now by Norah Smaridge 1974, The New England Catalog by Pequot Press.
American Home Crafts Magazine and Family Circle wrote features on us with large photos of our rugs and directions and patterns, as well as Yankee, Mother Earth News, Crafts, FiberArts, The Boston Globe Magazine, The Hartford Courant Northeast Magazine and many newspapers.

I have discovered that other historic rugmaking techniques that can be made with this same needle are called rugbee, caterpillar rugs, ruffley rugs, shirred and standing rugs.

Louise's personal herstory is about life in the public sphere. Editor of the Daily Echo news at Shortridge High in Indianapolis and radio actor, she graduated 5th in the first class at Purdue University to accept women in the Arts & Sciences. She became a 40's Big Band vocalist, high school English teacher and book reviewer in Michigan. She was a Shirret inventor who saw the potential for practicality and beauty combined.

Louise adored beautiful fabrics, and flew through stitches and rows of color. ShiRRéT™ was a pleasurable reminder of her childhood among cousins-aunts-uncles-grandparents in the same neighborhood, all sewing.

In 1997 with designer Jeanie Criscola's generosity, I rewrote - mostly at 3am - and republished Louise's book The Art of Shirret™

We've pooled our talents to spread the word. My sister Bettina McCrady, of the Wooodstock Inn VT, and her husband MARK, SPRINGFIELD PRINTING print the book and poster. My husband MARTIN AXON, PLATINUM PRESS, English printmaker publisher, and I fill orders from our studio Villa Riviera. Our children Lovis and Juliet, PAULALA GABRIEL, and Sandy who runs the health food co-op, join us. Two extremely large orange cats and Giant French Angora hare Thistledown Jack the Pumpkin King, keep the ShiRReT warm for photo ops. With our dad Harry, we maintain Louise's devotion to the wildly creative women of the U.S.

She named it ShiRRéT and this is Herstory.My mom and grandmother created practical beauty from humble materials.
They created the word ShiRRéT™.
They wrote patterns and taught in the Midwest and New England starting in the 1920's.
I'm LOUISE McCRADY's daughter, a NY painter.
I am curator, expert + archivist of Louise's life work in ShiRRéT American tapestry crochet, from the recent 86 years of my family. My children and I are the third and fourth generations of ShiRRéT. This is the ShiRRéT public archive. Louise made many of the carpets on this site. YOUR ShiRReT STORIES
Send a photo of your ShiRReT
Art historically, Shirret descends from ancient French and English tapestries. The scale of a Shirret tapestry stitch is (– so American ) gargantuan ! by comparison.
The subject of ShiRReT is not different from the geometric symbols of American quilts, lent meaning by connections to holidays and family rituals. The thousands of people who make these rare and beautiful American Art Tapestries put stories into their Shirret with every bit of fabric they use, clothing remnants from family members.
1920's Katherine Hart Ent Benson > 1960's Louise Benson McCrady > 1990's+ Louise's daughter Lady McCrady and grandchildren Lovis and Juliet
Louise McCrady learned this rag rug technique for turning scraps into gold from her mom. ShiRRéT is alchemy from the 1920's Depression "Waste not, want not".
Louise and her mother started teaching it in the late 1920's in Indiana and Ohio. In 1968 she began teaching in Connecticut, all New England, New Jersey and New York to thousands of people. We show ShiRRéT at the NewYork State Sheep and Wool festival in October.

Shirret™ is a meditative activity. Like gardening, baking or knitting it summons physical and philosophical riches to share with family and friends.Shirret™ is an artistic form that tells about the time and culture we live in.To Shirret™ is to be actively thoughtful of the environment by working constructively with hands and mind to create warmth, kindness and beauty.With support from Louise's friends around the country we continue her intentions: to beautify and inspire sustainability, creative thought and productive, intelligent action.
HerStory . . When my orange haired toddlers celebrated Lulu's 78th birthday in her favorite way - with pink food, a fairy cake and a magic wand - she told us again the story of Addie Hart in Indianapolis.
(Kurt Vonnegut says Indianapolis was designed by Hausmann, the architect of etoile Paris.) As a girl living in a cabin in what is now the downtown 'star' where the Indiana State House stands, Addie listened to the wolves in the moonlight.
Addie's parents were from Ireland. German Joseph Ent and she had 6 girls and 6 boys. Celtic storytelling, singing and dancing came from their mother and stern practicality came from their father. The girls had nimble fingers for needlework - and folding and pinning new shirts in the shirt factory. The 6 boys were builders and inventers. "And", Lulu said, "EVERYONE had red hair !"
I can see the cabbage rose and polka dot fine American cotton from the shirt factory in Katy's rugs. The strips are 3/4 inch, gathered and crocheted in the middle.Katrine Ent, my grandmother, was born in 1892. She told me that people made these rugs before the Civil War. There was a shortage of steel from the war - no more needles - and the technique died out.Katrine's rag rug experiments in the 1920's had her ripping out and redoing many rows at a time! Without the right numbers of stitches, the rugs could ruffle or cup instead of laying flat so she wrote patterns. Bringing her 18 year old daughter Louise, my grandmother distributed needles and patterns through L.S. Ayres department store,Indianapolis and Dayton Ohio.
Is crochet from fishing net-making? It is Irish-German-African-Polish-Caribbean-French-Mexican-Lebanese-Persian-Native-Latina-Native-Japanese-Canadian American. My friend - colleague Paula Gabriel (it means angel) thinks ShiRRéT is crocheted because our foremother didn't have a loom to weave the fabric scraps.
In the 1950's, Louise took her gaily colored handmade rugs up the road to a horse meet in Cheshire. She had improved the method, and used fabric from the wool mohair Chanel suits she made for herself. Her rugs were LUXE.
She named the method "ShiRRéT". She called a stitch with a fold a " Shirret stitch". She called the fabric on the needle "folds", which eliminated the need to sew any scraps together, and tiny scraps could be used easily. And instead of taking extra stitches to increase as crochet does, she simply took an extra fold off the needle. The old style of fabric crochet was unreliable. Louise wrote her REPEATABLE FORMULAS into patterns.
Her first book in 1968 was called Creative Rugcraft. She sold Shirret at craft fairs and mail order in magazines. Twenty friends taught it. We designed new patterns for magazines. Now you find Shirret all over the US.
Louise's shirret is included in A New Look At Crochet by Elyse Sommer 1973, The Teenager's Guide to Hobbies for Here and Now by Norah Smaridge 1974, The New England Catalog by Pequot Press.
American Home Crafts Magazine and Family Circle wrote features on us with large photos of our rugs and directions and patterns, as well as Yankee, Mother Earth News, Crafts, FiberArts, The Boston Globe Magazine, The Hartford Courant Northeast Magazine and many newspapers.I have discovered that other historic rugmaking techniques that can be made with this same needle are called rugbee, caterpillar rugs, ruffley rugs, shirred and standing rugs.
Louise's personal herstory is about life in the public sphere. Editor of the Daily Echo news at Shortridge High in Indianapolis and radio actor, she graduated 5th in the first class at Purdue University to accept women in the Arts & Sciences. She became a 40's Big Band vocalist, high school English teacher and book reviewer in Michigan. She was a Shirret inventor who saw the potential for practicality and beauty combined.
Louise adored beautiful fabrics, and flew through stitches and rows of color. ShiRRéT™ was a pleasurable reminder of her childhood among cousins-aunts-uncles-grandparents in the same neighborhood, all sewing.
In 1997 with designer Jeanie Criscola's generosity, I rewrote - mostly at 3am - and republished Louise's book The Art of Shirret™.
We've pooled our talents to spread the word. My sister Bettina McCrady, of the Wooodstock Inn VT, and her husband MARK, SPRINGFIELD PRINTING print the book and poster. My husband MARTIN AXON, PLATINUM PRESS, English printmaker publisher, and I fill orders from our studio Villa Riviera. Our children Lovis and Juliet, PAULALA GABRIEL, and Sandy who runs the health food co-op, join us. Two extremely large orange cats and Giant French Angora hare Thistledown Jack the Pumpkin King, keep the ShiRReT warm for photo ops. With our dad Harry, we maintain Louise's devotion to the wildly creative women of the U.S.