LADIES’ ALBUM FOR THE WORK TABLE; or Gift Book for 1849, containing new and elegant designs in crochet work, with a few words of advice on the choice of sewing and netting materials. By Madm. Dufour, Editress of the Work Table Department of “The Lady’s Newspaper”.

FIRST EDITION. Oblong 8vo, [200 x 188mm], pp. 23, [1] 'Index'; six lithograph illustrations printed in different colours; original ivory coloured wrappers decorated and titled in gilt.


Dufour published her work as a way of answering the numerous enquiries submitted to her weekly column for the Lady's Newspaper and Pictorial Times. Clearly designed to capitalise on the still popular 'Annuals' market Dufour probably intended the work to be part of a yearly series. Her introduction pushes quite hard the Raworth's Royal Sewing Thread as the ideal in cotton for work tables and the company may have had a hand in promoting her work.

Despite the French name, and her use of the French courtesy title Mademoiselle, Dufour was born in London in 1827 as Elizabeth Lenox, the daughter of an innkeeper. She lived with her sister and brother-in-law Nicholas and Martha Dormer who had the licence for running Betty's Chop House at 315 Strand. Elizabeth married Louis Isidore Dufour, a valet, in March 1848, but she was already using the name Madm. Dufour from the commencement of her articles in January 1848 for the Lady's Newspaper and Pictorial Times. The journal was published from an address only a few doors away along the Strand, roughly opposite Somerset House, and her column for the journal continue until 1854. It was also in 1854 that Elizabeth's husband, who was now named as licensee of Betty's Chop House, transferred the business and so presumably moved away from the Strand. We do not know what became of Elizabeth from that time until her death in 1869.

LHD locates copies at Oxford and the V&A.