Dorset button

Their manufacture was at a peak between 1622 and 1850, after which they were overtaken by machine-made buttons from factories in the developing industries of Birmingham and other growing cities.

Dorset buttons are characteristically made by repeatedly binding yarn over a disc or ring former.

[2] Wheels are made by variations on the same processes of Casting, Slicking, Laying and Rounding:[3] 'High Tops' and 'Dorset Knobs' are patterns that are taller, or nearly as tall, as they are wide.

These were made by using a small piece of triangular fabric and rolled and formed into a doughnut shape with a hole in the centre.

This form was then covered with blanket stitches 'Singletons' are made on a similar ring former to wheels, but this is padded with a disc of woven fabric that is then embroidered.

[6] Originally from Gloucestershire, he had been a soldier in Europe during the Thirty Years War but returned and married a girl from Wardour before settling in Shaftesbury.

It also had the advantage of being a home-based activity, which was more attractive than being outside in all weathers and also reduced expenditure on shoes and the wear and laundering of clothes.

[5] An Act of Parliament was passed in 1699 that, amongst its export restrictions on woolens, prevented the making of buttons “made of cloth, serge, drugget, or other stuffs”.

[13] The Act would remain in force for two hundred years, but in practice appears to have had little lasting effect on trade.

[12] These ring formers replaced the previous horn discs and began the characteristic Dorset styles of the wheel buttons.

[12] After a fire in 1731 destroyed the Bere depot, Elias Case, Abraham's son, employed as a manager a Yorkshire businessman, John Clayton, who reorganised the firm.

[14] Smaller collection offices across the county were established at Milborne Stileham,[3] Sixpenny Handley, Piddletrenthide, Langton and Wool.

Amongst the many industrial machines on display at the Great Exhibition was Mr John Ashton's button-making press, first patented in 1841.

The centralised factories, steam power and access to venture capital could not be competed with by the small-scale enterprises of rural Dorset.

Although the agrarian economy of Dorset remained profitable, the collapse of button-making led to much personal hardship.

[14] In the Edwardian period, renewed interest in traditional crafts led Florence, Dowager Lady Lees to attempt to revive the industry but this was frustrated by the outbreak of the Great War.

'Blandford Cartwheel' type of Dorset button, made in red and white yarn
'Blandford Cartwheel' button
Pair of crosswheel buttons