About
Allhallows Museum in Honiton holds the finest public collection of Honiton lace in existence, celebrating a tradition of intricate bobbin lacemaking that made this east Devon market town internationally famous for three centuries. Housed in a medieval building on Honiton High Street — the former Allhallows Chapel — the museum combines an exceptional craft collection with the broader history of a town that owed its prosperity to the coaching route between London and Exeter.
Honiton lace is a form of bobbin lace made by threading bobbins on a lace pillow to build up complex patterns of threads. Its characteristic design combines floral motifs — roses, carnations, fuchsias, and honeysuckle — with a fine ground that shows off the delicacy of the individual sprigs. At its height in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries, Honiton lace was the finest needlepoint and bobbin lace produced in England, worn by the aristocracy and used to decorate royal court dress. The most celebrated commission in the lace's history was Queen Victoria's wedding dress of 1840, for which two hundred lacemakers from Beer and Branscombe on the south Devon coast worked for eight months to produce the train and trim, at a cost of a thousand pounds.
The museum holds many hundreds of examples of lace spanning from the seventeenth century to the modern period, from coarse working samples to the finest competition pieces. Lace tools, pattern books, bobbins, and pillows document the craft technology alongside the finished pieces. The collection also documents the social history of the lacemaking industry — a cottage industry that employed large numbers of women and children in the villages around Honiton, providing an essential supplement to agricultural wages in the rural economy.
Beyond the lace collection, the museum documents Honiton's history as one of the principal stopping points on the coaching route between London and Exeter. The turnpike road through the town brought prosperity, inns, and the trade associated with a relay of horses and passengers. The town's long, straight High Street — characteristic of coaching towns — preserves its Georgian and Victorian commercial character. Honiton's recovery from a series of devastating fires in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries is also documented, explaining why the town centre retains so little of its earlier character.
The Allhallows building itself is of historical interest as one of the few medieval buildings to have survived Honiton's fires, and the museum's occupation of this ancient space gives its displays a distinctive character.
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Plan Your Visit
⏱️ Recommended Visit Duration
💡 Visitor Tips
- The museum is open Easter to October — it closes for the winter season. Check exact dates on the website before visiting.
- Ask staff about lacemaking demonstrations — they are occasionally given in the museum and provide an invaluable insight into the extraordinary skill required to make even a simple Honiton sprig.
- The museum shop sells genuine Honiton lace made by local craftspeople — an opportunity to acquire an authentic example of this historic craft directly from its home town.
- Honiton is one of the best antique towns in the South West — combine your museum visit with exploring the antique shops along the High Street, many of which stock vintage lace and lacemaking equipment.
- The Jurassic Coast villages of Beer and Branscombe, the original home of the lacemakers who made Queen Victoria's wedding dress, are a twenty-minute drive south and are worth combining with a museum visit.
- Honiton station is served by Great Western Railway from Exeter and London Waterloo — the museum is about ten minutes' walk from the station.
- The Allhallows building's medieval character makes it photogenic — photographs are welcome inside.
- Bring a magnifying glass if you want to fully appreciate the finest pieces of Honiton lace on display — the intricacy of the work is astonishing.
Highlights
Honiton Lace Collection
The museum holds one of the world's finest collections of Honiton lace, spanning from the seventeenth century to the present day.
The collection ranges from early examples of the delicate sprigs that characterised Honiton's distinctive style — individually made motifs of flowers, birds, and leaves that were assembled on a ground — through eighteenth-century pieces of extraordinary refinement to Victorian competition laces made to demonstrate the highest levels of skill.
The collection documents the full range of the tradition, from commercial working pieces to the exceptional exhibition and royal commission laces that made Honiton's reputation.
Queen Victoria's Wedding Dress
The most celebrated chapter in Honiton lace history was Queen Victoria's wedding to Prince Albert on 10 February 1840. Victoria chose Honiton lace for her wedding dress — a deliberate decision to support the struggling Devon lace industry — commissioning a design incorporating characteristic sprigs from over two hundred lacemakers in the villages of Beer and Branscombe on the south Devon coast.
The train and trim cost over a thousand pounds and required eight months of work.
The museum displays related materials and examples of the lace style used for the royal commission, placing this famous order in its human and industrial context.
Lacemaking Craft and Technology
The museum holds an extensive collection of lacemaking equipment including bobbins, pillows, pricking cards, and pattern books that document the craft technology of Honiton lacemaking.
The bobbins are themselves objects of considerable craft interest — often turned from bone or wood and decorated with beads, inscriptions, and coloured threads, they were frequently given as personal gifts and could be family heirlooms. Demonstrations of lacemaking are occasionally given in the museum, and the collection allows visitors to understand the extraordinary patience and skill required to produce even the simplest Honiton sprig.
The Lacemaking Industry and its Workers
Honiton lace was made not in workshops but in cottages — a domestic industry spread across dozens of villages in east Devon. Women and children as young as five were taught to make lace, providing essential income for rural families in a region where agricultural wages were chronically low. The museum documents this social history of the industry, exploring the conditions in which lacemakers worked, the role of lace buyers and dealers who distributed the work, and the impact of the trade's eventual decline in the late nineteenth century as machine-made lace undercut handmade prices.
Collections
Allhallows Museum holds the most comprehensive public collection of Honiton lace in existence, comprising several hundred individual pieces spanning from the seventeenth century to the modern period. The collection includes examples of all the characteristic Honiton lace types: individual sprigs, assembled pieces, and complete garments including veils, collars, and accessories.
Lacemaking equipment includes one of the finest collections of decorated bobbins in the country.
The broader collection covers the natural history of east Devon, the social history of Honiton as a coaching town, and the archaeological and documentary record of the town and district. Photography and archival material document both the lace industry and the town's community life across three centuries.
Honiton Lace: Three Centuries of a Devon Craft
A comprehensive survey of Honiton lace from its origins in the seventeenth century to the present-day revival, including the story of Queen Victoria's wedding dress.
📍 Lace Galleries
Honiton Through Time
The history of Honiton from its medieval origins through the coaching era to the twentieth century.
📍 Town History Gallery
Current Exhibitions
No current exhibitions. Please check the museum website for updates.