Category Archives: Project

Selvedge Fringe

Tartan, Weaving

The tartan throw is now half finished – this wet weather is certainly helping! Yesterday I had a trip up to Townsend to do some final measuring of spaces for the Fiber Arts Festival. All went well and we managed to squeeze in one more vendor making us full+. On return I checked the studio build for drips/leaks and as there was nothing significant, started on the weaving.

I decided to have a fringe on all 4 sides on this throw. Normal end fringes are taken care of with the loom waste and simple knotting will look fine on this project. To add the side fringes meant adding a floating selvedge beyond the last warp end at the distance to make an approximately 6″ fringe (a little less after knotting). The yarn for this needs to be reasonably slippery to allow the weft yarn to loop around and then slide towards the weaver as progressive picks are added. I used some very slippery nylon cord I had in the workshop, looped it onto the breast beam then through the reed, no heddles and weighted over the back beam. When ready to wind on I take some scissors, stretch the weft loops away from the floating selvedge and cut it in a group. Then working from the previously knotted edge take the appropriate number of weft picks and tie a simple overhead knot (I do groups of 4).

Depending where in the pattern I stop to wind on, this may leave either two or no ‘left over picks’. If two then they get knotted into the next batch by adding the first two of the new block to make up the 4. Overall this is a fairly tidy finish. There is no problem of the edge of the weaving drawing in unevenly as the edge is controlled by the knots.

  • Looped weft picks
  • Knotted fringe
  • Slippery floating selvedge

When winding on, once the cloth has wrapped around the cloth beam care should be taken so that the knots are flipped up before they go around the beam to ensure they don’t get under the cloth and start impacting the evenness of the tension. As they move around the beam they’ll drop down and eventually wrap (outside the edge of the cloth – so no impact on tension).

More rain today, but I do have to finish fitting the garage door so weaving will wait until tonight.

Card Weaving

Equipment, Project, Tartan, Weaving

At the last Scenic Valley Handweavers Guild meeting one of the members returned my card weaving book which somehow ended up with me volunteering to lead an ‘introduction’ to card-weaving at the August meeting.  Given that my experience to date was to read said book and produce a band which was turned into a strap for my mandolin with the addition of some leather ends.  Hardly an expert!!

Nevertheless I do have plenty of time (I know, famous last words) to prepare, so to that end I have begun some background research into resources (lots and lots available via the Internet) and to start weaving some test bands which I will take along to meetings from now until then to drum up interest.

The first challenge was to find my set of cards in the weaving room – first fail.  They’re there somewhere, but under something and certainly not on the shelf where other related items are.  Plan ‘b’: produce my own…

I made a small set out of 100lb card stock – similar to playing card thickness – by drawing them on the computer 4 to a page then printing them out and punching holes and finally cutting out the individual cards.  This seems to work until a bit more tension appears when the twist builds up (more on that below).  I used a wooden ruler as a beater last time I wove this way which works but is not quite as ‘classy’ as a combo beater/stick-shuttle.  I had some seasoned white oak that I’d stored in the shed for a couple of years so quickly cut out, shaped, and sanded a test model.  Works fine!

Custom cards
Custom beater
Trial band

The warp yarn was the 8/2 tencel I used in the recent scarves.  I was curious to see if the solid and variegated contrast would show up. It did.  I’ve initially used a thicker weft yard but will also weave some with the same yarn as the warp to shorten the pattern and tidy up the selvedges a little.  This pattern calls for just backward turning of the cards which leads to twist building up behind the cards and would normally shorten the amount of warp yarn available for weaving and as mentioned adds tension which my thin cards don’t handle well.  The solution was to attach the warp at the back to fishing spinners so that each 4 warp yarn ends that pass through a card, can be ‘unwound’ simply by letting the spinner spin.

warp spinnersIn this case I just attached the spinners to a rod held onto the table by small clamps.  When the tension builds (excess twist) it is simple to slide something from each card towards the spinner and at some stage it slips and releases all the spin.  This test band only has 10 cards;  with larger amounts of cards more spinners would obviously be needed and a more advanced approach to space them out in rows would be required.

I still have to add a coat of varnish to the beater so that color from the yarn doesn’t stain it and find a better front attachment – I’m currently using a mid-sized clamp that works fine but gets in the way when sitting at the table.

Other work for the day was some more threading heddles and sleying the reed for the tartan throw – slow but steady progress there.  I also sewed the bias binding edging onto the Florida tartan place-mat/table runner set.  It worked out well so now I’ll finish the rest so that this house-warming gift can be delivered.

Dressing the loom
Florida tartan place-mat

 

 

Weekend off

Project, Tartan, Weaving

We decided to head to Nashville for our anniversary break and are now back in the valley.  It was our first visit there and we certainly overdosed on the huge variety of music and entertainment.  Our downtown hotel allowed us to walk everywhere to sample food, entertainment, play pool, darts and try a few different drinks.  Sunday morning it was nice to go for a walk in the much quieter parts of the city, before heading home after lunch.

Clean loom
Warp on the angel wings
Warp spread through the raddle

Leading up to and on return from the trip I have been working on the tartan throw.  First job was to clean up after the Christmas towels and scarves.  30 cotton towels tends to shed a lot of dust and very fine cotton fluff.  I managed to burn out the vacuum cleaner rubber drive band as I didn’t notice that the upright vacuum was sitting on a rya rug while I was using the hose to get under the loom – until I smelt some very hot rubber/smoke!  I should have bought a model that automatically disables the spinning brushes when the vacuum tube is disconnected.  Anyway – the cleaning finished I was able to then start dressing the loom by putting the individual sections of warp (9) onto the angle wings and then spread them across the back beam via the raddle.  I couldn’t find my home made raddle for this loom so had to use the one that fits my upright loom.  It has 1/2″ spacing so I used 8 then 7 ends in each space across the width.  I still have to lash the rod onto the back apron and then with help, wind it on to the warp beam.

Custom Tartans

Project, Studio, Tartan, Weaving

An idea that is slowly coming together from the initial seed (from Anne) is that I create a business line that deals with tartans and specifically custom designed tartans.  Largely inspired by some previous and current efforts this would entail working with a customer who supplies color palette thoughts.  I would use weaving design software to work those colors into some tartan examples then work through the process of selecting appropriate yarn, adjusting colors appropriately, then finally weaving the selected cloth – for any purpose.

My first custom tartan was a ‘family tartan’ for Anne and I, combining colors from both of our family ancestral histories.

Tennessee Prentice Family Tartan
Handwoven Tartan

For this tartan I spun the wool and made a 3 ply yarn.  It was then dyed, with commercial dyes to get the bright colors, and finally woven in a traditional twill.  Given the time taken to spin and ply the wool this only made enough cloth for a small cushion! Definitely not the way to make material for a kilt!

The second custom design was for a housewarming gift for friends in Florida.  The red and white was from room colors in the house, while the blue, green and black were for the waters where Chris enjoys his hobby of diving.

Bond Florida tartan
Bond Tartan

This tartan was woven with 8/2 cotton in the chosen colors.  I began weaving this at the 2019 Smoky Mountain Fiber Arts Festival and even wore a kilt on the Saturday whilst doing so.

The current project is a tartan throw for another housewarming gift for a friend in Southern Virginia.  She gave us colors of the pokeweed bush and a belted kingfisher.  That gave me some fairly good contrasting colors to work with.

First design
Winding the warp

The computer design looks way better than the screen shot, but got the go-ahead from Terri.  Then finding yarns that would come close to those colors took a little while, but eventually everything needed was available in 3/2 mercerized cotton from the Yarn Barn.  I’m winding the warp in smaller groups (9 required) before dressing the loom).  I’ll update with a separate post on the progress.

The final tartan will be a baby blanket for a nephew. He and his wife are having their first child in a few months.  We have the colors but as yet I haven’t even started on the design.

Custom design and products is one part of the original idea.  There are also ideas for classes in designing, color choices, weaving, etc that might someday be taught in the Kiwiweave studio.

Guild Activity

Looms, Project, Weaving

I volunteered (was volunteered?) to run the January program for the Scenic Valley Handweavers Guild (scenicvalleyhandweavers.blogspot.com) as they had a gap in their program.  I recalled a program we had at the Wellington Weavers Group I had participated in during our year back in NZ.  The group set up a loom (it was an 8 shaft table loom) with a white warp with a point twill threading then each member participating wove their own yarn as weft in one of the many suggested variations of treadling.  Anne and I both produced very nice looking towels when our turn came up.  The idea was you wove your sample and then moved the loom on to the next person on the list. It seemed like an ideal exercise for this guild as it would give our rigid heddle weavers a chance to experiment with a table loom.

Phyllis (who owns R&M Yarns where we have our monthly meetings (www.rmyarns.com)) had a nice handmade table loom out the back, and I took on the task of dressing the loom before the meeting and preparing some basic guidance for using the loom and some information on drawdowns and designs that might be woven on the point twill (for 4 shaft) threading.

20190114_114826-774x1032

The warp was 8/2 cotton (donated by Phyllis) and I wound on enough for 10 people to participate (weaving around 22 inches of their chosen design in their choice of 8/2 cotton (or other) and some space between woven tabby to make into rolled hems.  The threading almost went perfectly, but unfortunately I discovered a threading error – made a quick replacement heddle and fixed the error, but I should have checked a little bit more thouroughly.  It looked right on the tabby sheds, but I didn’t check if I had fixed it for the twill sheds. As it turns out the error looked to be gone, as on a tabby shed the fix I did put it on shaft 2 and it would have looked the same on shaft 4.  Unfortunately for twill it was the wrong choice (should have been 4) which I didn’t pick up until I started weaving twill after my header/tabby hem!  I left it in and pointed it  out during my intro!

My own choice for pattern and color was for a potential gift towel set done in red, white, and blue (the white being the warp) and the colors coming in from the 2/2 twill weft shots.  The point twill will produce diamonds if woven 1234, 1234, 1234, 3214, 3214, 3214 and repeating, but I expanded that sequence by not only weaving 2/2 twill but starting with 1/3 twill then 2/2 twill then 3/1 then reverse and repeat with each having a portion of the complete sequence.  This stretched the diamond out and shows varying amounts of the white background.  I changed between red and blue after each complete sequence.

The design came out reasonably well (minus the white line on the right side – the threading error) and has a certain 4th of July fireworks look about it, so I think it will be a go for making some sets for sale/gifts come May/June.  I’ll do that on one of my floor looms as although the table loom works just fine it is fairly slow weaving when you have to change each shed by hand.  On a floor loom I can do a direct tie-up and treadle with my feet and just throw the shuttle and beat.

At the February meeting the loom was on the number 7 person so should be all finished by our next meeting.  I will cut the samples off – wet finish them and cut them up to hand out a the following meeting.  For the March meeting we are doing a similar exercise but with a rigid heddle loom which I am looking foward to as I have not had much experience with that type of weaving.

2018 Tennessee Valley Handspinners Guild challenge

Project, Spinning

The guild committee set the challenge for members this year.  Using wool from new members who raise East Friesian sheep for the milk.  We are to: clean, prepare, spin and ‘make’ something before October this year.

I bought 2 lb of locks (a little over priced, but this is guild driven) as I have in mind producing a lap rug which will have some naturally dyed features  (walnut/indigo, indigo, and the natural white) in a plaid design.  The second driver for this project is that it will suffice as an entry in the Blue Ribbon festival later this year that I normally attend.

I have been looking at the two shopping bags of wool for some time now, but today I finally tried washing a few locks using the standard wool process.  Hot water bath with a small amount of Dawn dishwashing liquid.  Soak 15 minutes, then two rinses at the same temperature and time.  The first plain, the second with a drop or two of vinegar.

The locks were fairly dirty with matted tips and a reasonable amount of vegetable matter.  The wash/rinse opened up the locks and removed a lot of the dirt.  The vegetable matter will drop out as we card the locks and the blending will mix the small amount of staining to produce a slightly off white finished batt.  There is a small amount of grease left in the lock – just enough for easy preparation and spinning.

I may end up blending in some Clun Forest locks as we card to bulk out the amount to make sure I have enough for the entire project.  This wool has slightly less crimp, but otherwise the lock length and diameter seem pretty similar.  We still have several bags of clean Clun Forest Locks.

Next step will be to wash larger lots and then hand it all over to Anne who is the carding expert.  Once we have batts it will be back to me to spin.