I just received the most beautiful shuttle from Ampstrike, the Etsy shop of Gunnar Karro in Estonia. Click to enlarge. I've included the glasses to indicate scale.
I pause now to enjoy it. A bright beacon in a crazy world.
This is a Sami shuttle, used by the nomadic people of Northern Europe. Its curved pointed shape is well suited to pickup patterning in band weaving.
The fabric from yesterday's post has been washed & tumbled dry. Here are scans of the face and reverse of the cloth. Click to enlarge. Very fun!
My word, did this ever shrink!!! Take-up and shrinkage in both directions was a whopping 25%. Beware.
The draft is on handweaving.net as 74557.
It is interesting to compare the scale differential of the deflected double weave at 40 epi (small sample) and 20 epi (large sample). Exactly the same draft. In fact, the larger sample was tied onto the warp of the smaller sample, after resleying the reed.
I may go yet a bit bigger yarnwise & settwise, in order to weave something that after shrinkage will be wide enough to be a placemat, instead of a wimpy washcloth.
Now, in other news, I'm saving my spent tealeaves & wrapping them up in white linen to stain them randomly for who knows what. Maybe some stitching.
And today we finally broke loose from confinement and ventured downtown to see the sights. What a gorgeous almost-fall day, clear and windy and cool. The few strolling folks we met were (mostly) masked, and we easily found parking. It was so good to have a change of scenery. Bruce did his click! click! click! thing, and I just looked around in amazement at all the changes. It was too windy to get the sketchbook out.
The wild boar gave his attention to the hand sanitizer kiosk.
The sign in the window of the Chocolate Moose Bakery is a Julia Child quote: A Party without cake is really just a meeting. All Zoomers take note.
Yes, it was great to get out. I must do it more often. Instead of sitting around the breakfast table taking selfies with a spoon.
What if the sley of the little deflected double weave sample were doubled, and fatter yarns were used? For one thing, the width of the warp in the reed would be twice as large!
All those spaces will close up after washing, as you know.
Tech stuff: warp, 6/2 unmercerized cotton, natural, and lt. brown 5/2 cotton, mercerized, 20 epi, 2 ends per dent in a 10 dent reed. Weft same, 20 ppi.
The healing power of weaving.