Weaverly

Pattern Gamp

Typepad is still working on fixing "issues", so you may not be seeing all my pictures yet, but things are definitely improving. I am optimistic.

Patterns in the natural world always get my attention. Small units endlessly repeated in new combinations.

Alternate possibilities.

Overlapping bands of texture and color.

I've been admiring the pattern gamps my fellow weavers have been producing, along the lines of Janet Phillips's wonderful examples in  her books Designing Woven Fabrics and Exploring Woven Fabrics. So I decided to do one of my own, for 4-shaft weaves. I used a few of the threadings in Phillips's books and added a more of my own. Same with treadlings. It was great fun to weave, and I enjoyed seeing all the new patterns emerge in their turn.

There were 8 different threadings and 32 treadlings in the first gamp. But more ideas kept popping up, and there was enough warp left for a second, smaller gamp, with 8 additional treadlings, for a grand total of 320 patterns to add to my library!

Of course they changed considerably after washing, which was part of the fun. Here are the finished gamps:

And a closeup:

The next project, which I'm warping now, is to take four of these little patterns and combine them into one cloth. Stay tuned.

If any of these pictures fail to load, try again tomorrow. Maybe Typepad will have settled down by then.

Shifting Palettes

Last week we spent a few days in Beaufort SC (not to be confused with Beaufort NC) and enjoyed poking around on St. Helena Island. Here's that wonderful ruin that visitors love to photograph. 

What I find especially interesting about this building is the oyster shells used as the basis for its construction. Not to mention the thousands of shades of gray (I do not exaggerate).

Widening our palette, here are the marshlands, ever changing their aspect at different times of day. 

Back home again, the autumn colors begin to take precedence. We are in the Piedmont, after all.

In a walk around the lake this morning, I came across this mother duck and her brood. She didn't seem to mind my taking a few pictures. The waterfowl around here are very tame. Don't you love that collection of warm neutrals, and the little shock of the red?

Of course there is plenty of drama. It depends on which way you aim your sights. Here we are looking up.

But looking down, the picture is equally intriguing, but with a more muted palette.

Last night was the first frost, and the color shift is continuing a trend toward monochromatic. 

Back in the studio, I have just completed a linen sampler. There were four distinct warp sections of 3-color rotations, and I crossed these with bands of 12 different wefts. I am trying to embrace as many different color possibilities in this information-gathering. Forty-eight options here.

Eight shafts. One-shuttle weaving. Following are some closeups.

The structure is twill with three parallel interleaved threadings.

I used a black floating selvedge, but in the eventual project the floating selvedge will be the same color as the weft.

Click on any of these to enlarge.

New Moon, New Warps

This was a couple of nights ago, just as we were locking up. The moon and Venus.

There's more and more color on the Trail.

But plenty of good monochrome, too.

Remember the red warp I was trying to rescue? There were several false starts, miscounted heddles, typical newbies' mistakes.

But at the end of the day it turned out OK. I am using a single shuttle for this multicolor "garbage warp", with a pink cotton flake yarn.

The threading is rosepath on 4 shafts, and the treadling is a simple point twill.

It will eventually make its way into something wearable. 

And on the Jane, there is this linen sampler just tied onto an older warp. Eight shafts.



Department of Books: Finished reading The Summer Book by Tove Jansson and Unsettled Ground by Claire Fuller.

Waiting

It appears that we may have gotten lucky with the track of Hurricane Ian. At this point (Friday evening) it is tracking somewhat more to the east of us. We haven't lost power. Fingers crossed.

This is what the sky looked like yesterday at sundown. Check out that moon.

On the 8-shaft loom I am struggling with some possibly poor color choices in a 3-color interleaved warp. The jury's still out. Must wash & dry first. 

On the 4-shaft loom I came to the end of the jin warp. 

All seven towels have been hemmed & washed (what else do you do when you're waiting for weather?).

I rewarped with a warp I had wound several months ago, but in my haste I lost the cross. I'm going to try to rescue this warp. I'll let you know how it goes. I'm about 50% hopeful.

Good luck to all who have not been as fortunate with the weather. 

 

Lin, Jin, Win.

Our local study group is taking a look at jin this year, so I thought I'd try a combination of jin and double weave in one cloth. I'm using 30/2 linen from LoftyFiber. Here are some warping snapshots. 36 epi.

The narrow black stripes are double weave, and the red and orange stripes are jin. The double weave places pouf up a bit, which I expected. It's a fun effect. I'm wondering how they will  change after wet finishing. 

Another point of interest is that the double weave stripes take up less than the jin areas. I may have to add a tensioning modification for these. Perhaps extra weights at the back beam. We shall see.

This is all a riff on double weave selvedges. I'm enjoying this project.

In the Department of Books, I've just finished reading After Lives by Abdulrazak Gurnah. Highly recommended.

Zero Waste Weaving

The garbage warp from yesterday was tied on to the dummy warp (what terrible names for our beloved materials), the knots passed through the reed and heddles, and here you see the progress so far, from behind the heddles, on the way to the warp beam.

Meanwhile, in front of the loom, the warp chains are patiently waiting, and the weights have been attached.

After the beaming, the warp has been tamed and is waiting for the shuttle. If you click to enlarge, you can see what a variety of yarn types are included.

It's a straight threading, and here is my proposed draft. I'm not sure what you would call it. It's little spots of warp floats and weft floats, arranged in satin order. It has a family resemblance to huck, but some might call it a crepe. 

And here are the first few inches woven. 

A Dummy Warp

Perhaps you've been here. All your bobbins full, and nowhere to park the odds & ends of yarn on them.

Time to make a dummy warp. Its only function will be something on which to tie a new warp. This will be a straight threading on 16 shafts, two yards long. 

Then I made several warp chains out of the yarn on the aforementioned bobbins, and added in some more yarn, to make up enough warp ends to equal the number of ends in the dummy warp. Six yards long.

At some point this weekend I will tie the new warps onto the dummy, and then drag the whole mess through the reed and the heddles. I know, not my usual warping method (I'm a back-to-front warper). Am I crazy? Probably.

Meanwhile, on another loom, there is still jin. 

Quintet

A quintet of towels in jin weave on 4 shafts, cut off & hemmed, & given a good bath. 

Certainly a family resemblance, but the slightly different weft on each towel makes a subtle difference.

That sparkly effect is from a variegated cotton yarn in the warp. It slightly confounds the pattern recognition, but improves the flavor, like adding raisins to your rye bread recipe.

And the following is a complete surprise—right at my front door! 

In the Department of Books, I just finished reading Evelyn Waugh's "Sword of Honor." A bit of a slog in parts, but overall an excellent war novel. Wickedly funny with a very dark underpinning. Definitely worth the time I spent on it.

Jin on 4 (Again)

This lovely long warp is perfect for using up little bits of yarn stash. I'm still weaving jin on 4 shafts, and the treadling is easy (musical interlude of "Summertime" here). 

Today I got into the greens.

And how can I avoid it? Yellows will have to be next.

Over at Swan Lake, the water level has been drawn way down. I assume they are doing maintenance. The wildlife are confused. Ducks have been walking in the roads.

Although this fellow seems content.

Back home, I am reminded just how much I love my little breakfast room. It's actually at its best in the evening, when the monstera casts a fine shadow.

Jin on 16

More fun and games with jin, aka warp-faced compound tabby, this time on 16 shafts. I did a little experimenting with 3-color jin, with 3 colors rotating in the warp, so that in a single block you can have one color on top or 2 colors on top, and of course the reverse on the other side. Here are the six possible combinations with six shafts for each block, and the remaining 4 shafts just perfect for a double weave selvedge. 

As always, the colors change character depending on the viewing angle and the lighting conditions.

An oddity about having two colors sharing the same space in the reed is that occasionally they change places, as you can plainly see in the following picture. Click to enlarge. This give a slightly streaked effect. It will be interesting to see what happens with this after cutting off and washing.

Is this an error? Do we have to figure out how to deal with it, or just embrace it as a fact of life? The jury is still out. 

Meanwhile, many thanks to Pat for providing me with the perfect yellow. I wanted a "nasty yellow" and this is certainly it. Aggressive, not too warm. Pat is also the one who pointed me in the direction of the double weave selvedge. Beautiful, dependable, and an elegant method of doing away with the unlovable floating selvedge. The only downside is that it consumes four of your shafts.