Dr Consiglia Azzopardi has presented Bishop Mario Grech with a copy of her book `Maltese Lace: History and Mystery, Four Centuries of Bizzilla,’ which looks at the history and development of lace in our country.

Her book on the local tradition of lace making was launched recently in the Diocesan Seminary Hall in Gozo. Bishop Grech remarked that lace was a major catalyst in the Gozo Church.

Dr Azzopardi was born in Gharb in 1946. She learnt Maltese bobbin-lace as a child, at home from relatives, and from the neighbourhood where the crafts were widely practised on doorsteps, in alleys and in sheltered street corners.

‘Bizzilla’ – as it is known in Maltese – became her favourite hobby until she graduated as a Primary school Teacher and then started to teach lace-making courses run during the summer holidays.

Teaching lace-making at the Girls’ Trade School, and later at the Gozo School of Arts, brought Consiglia into contact with lace-makers from the different villages in Gozo and Malta, who produced ‘pricking patterns’ from all over the Island.

She started teaching Maltese lace at the University of Malta Gozo Campus 1995, when she instigated a Certificate and a Diploma course under the auspices of the University. This created an opportunity to start collecting material and information, before it was too late, at a time when the lace industry was declining rapidly.

A study of the history of Maltese Lace was also undertaken. At the University of Malta, she read for an M.Phil degree with the theme ‘Antique Maltese lace of the Time of the Knights 1530 – 1798,’ and later for a Ph.D. researched ‘Maltese Lace of the 19th and 20th Centuries.’

Photograph: Gozo Diocese

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