Fingering lace

I like the transparency and fragility of lace, especially the approach taken in the recent exhibition at Museum of art and design in an exhibit called Slash, Paper under the knife. I am interested in the traditional methods of lace making but after exploring that I would also like to try using the laser cutter... I have also recently discovered the joys of paper making and would also like to incorporate that by layering up methods to make mix media highly un-wearable lace samples.
Making lace, trapping this in hand made paper, possibly using fibres rather than paper pulp to make 'fabric' paper then re-cutting my lace design into that.
BUT i do not want to use the traditional imagery that is used with lace. It is almost always floral and, although admittedly beautiful, intricate designs, I don't want to just make my own version of something thats already out there. So i started looking into the context of lace.
Lace to me seems like a fabric that is used to convey a strong message, either one that is concealing or retaining privacy like on a vale, or a mesh on a burka or the netting that hangs off funeral hats. OR it is used to entice like the lace on underwear.
I want to write my own messages in lace, to create a pieces of work that when looked into reveal alot more than they first appear to, like lace...

so in conjunction with this and my love of drawing (which i really want to push in this project) I am going to base my work around sign language. I want to use well known hand gestures and actual sign language, defensive, offensive, inviting, ironic, historic, whatever my mood takes me to at the time probably. I have started making drawings and taking photo's.

I also have an animation idea to go with this but i will post about that when I have some images for it. all this writing gets pretty dull...