At some point during my time gardening, I made a visit to the Reuse Center and spontaneously found this semi- functional vintage sewing machine. A Necchi Supernova (automatica) from about 1955. I didn’t really need any convincing, faced with the khaki, vespa styling of this machine. I made sure the chrome wheel operated smoothly and I hoisted the heavy tray onto my hip. I didn’t have any idea about sewing in my mind when I walked in, but I pretty much immediately grasped a sense of purpose in this beautiful durable machine. I have only ever been so gripped by the near agency of an object before in the form of a book— a particular sense that some possibility, or ability, or path is embedded in the specific tool, and a sudden onset of the feeling, as in a library or bookstore, or now reuse center, that I have to get this artifact home. It belongs in a museum!
Inspiration aside, when I got the machine home it did run but erratically, in a very sudden cycle. I could only get decent stitches in the straight stitch mode. I now know that this can be evidence of resistance in the machine which is only overcome at high motor speed, thus the 0-60 effect. To no surprise, it needed a cleaning and oiling. In the months since first learning to operate these mostly metal machines Ive gotten better at naming what charms me so in their oiling- they really are scale implementations of the same kind of mechanics of the age of steam! Lubrication is their original sin, part of virtually all machine operation…
Beneath the top panel I removed the automatic mechanism, which translates the regular radial motion of the drive axle into a ratchet-advancing drive for pattern cassettes. A system of 3 levers are pressed against the surface of an interchangeable star shaped disc (‘supernova’). The profile of each disk moves a lever, which carries that motion to the controls for the stitch length, width or advance/reverse speed controls, causing them to move “automatically”. The mechanism works vaguely like a music box cylinder, with one element “reading” the surface of a rotating disc. potentially Infinite embroidered stitches can be created by mixing and matching the discs.
With that assembly out of the way I could get some light solvents in and clear some sticky sections of the drive train. The next day I oiled and replaced all the parts and tried again…
With everything cleaned up and lubricated I was able to control the speed a lot more precisely, tested by making a pin cushion which has since (following careful de-pinning ) been given to our cats.
Something still wasn’t quite right though, and as I investigated I soon found the final source of the friction. The bobbin winder which is located on the inside of a flip-out door near the hand wheel was still engaged even when stowed away— it was acting as a little rubber brake! And when I took apart the assembly and tried to replace just the door, I found it needed the whole unit in order to stay closed at all. So i took it off altogether and suffered a gaping hole on the face of my machine while I took to a new hobby altogether: sourcing vintage stuff on ebay…
There, it’s common to find machines that have been disassembled, sold by the individual part. I found what I needed pretty quickly but my interest was piqued: a set of original attachments, including embroidery discs, and a pair of original owners manuals were soon mine.
Using the battered tray that my machine came with as reference, I designed an integrated storage container for the supernova, its attachments, and an array of sewing notions, though it was more of a modelling flex and not really something I knew how to build ... At some point I will probably build a system of crates sharing some standard dimensions for all my different machines.
I’ve had issues with the impulse rate of the embroidery mechanism, and haven’t gotten it to make reliable decorative stitches, but produces great straight and zigzag stitches. I made a small quilt with a lot of repetitive seams to get a feel for its quirks, how it likes its thread tension, how it feeds, etc.
My first impression of this machine was about what a communist feel it had to it— which in hindsight I think was just my modern puzzlement at a stylish piece of tech that is designed to be durable! It is so dissonant with the way technology is valued in our late capitalist sense of reality as to almost suggest a delirious political agency in simply its longevity. Add to that its drab chicness and khaki styling, and the fact that it is of the moment just after the second world war, before global trade had become the new world hegemony. I had a little hope that it could have been somehow influenced by world leftism, thinking of the history of cooperative manufacturing in the Mediterranean.
Unfortunately, I only credited this darling from the perspective of what our modern market for sewing machines, or technology more broadly, lacks. You just cant find many consumer oriented (and styled), full metal sewing machines anymore. The same goes for any appliance, really. Usually, as in refrigerators, and cars, there’s a very plain reason for the constant advancement, but this machine comes close to equal with its modern equivalents for features and could outlive their proper function by a power of ten.
Necchi itself began producing sewing machines in Italy based on patents owned by singer, the arch monopoly in sewing machine history. So, nothing so politically ground breaking or paradigm shifting in the roots of the organization. The Supernova was a hit at the time of its introduction because of its sleek design and its novel automatic embroidery stitch system but was also very heavily built, almost entirely of cast iron and machined alloys. Under the body lines the supernova is a lot like an improved machine of the 1920s.
There was a boom in patents for sewing machine improvements around the turn of the century, which coalesced around the time of their expiration into the modern integrated sewing machine capable of a variety stitches, many of which had been proprietary. Before, even the channel for thread tails on heavy duty needles was originally a feature unique to Pfaff needles! I’m left wondering if the supernovas unique combination of stylish and overbuilt is a result of desire and marketing having only just overtaken usefulness and longevity; whether its overbuilt qualities are vestigial and its styling natal. The Supernova’s successor, the Mirella, is featured in Moma’s permanent collection. Obviously 70 years later, consumer devices of all kinds are understood for their materiality in about as much of a way as we can understand the materiality of a jpeg; its pretty much image all the way down.
Whatever lingering hopes I had reserved for the political materiality, and the industrial-consumer end user of this machine were effectively over upon finding the original marketing materials. However as if to drive home my materialist confusion, the product delivered on even its most fantastic claim: my supernova has entered the 21st century!