Category: Weaving

Dyeing · Weaving

July

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Weaving

July has been and gone so I thought I’d better post here before too much of August has passed and I had forgotten what I’ve been up to. Thank goodness the photos on my phone have dates on them 🙂

I finished weaving the Monk’s Belt placemats from Season 6 of Jane Stafford’s School of Weaving. They’re waiting to be hemmed, which might get done before the end of August.

Once my jack loom was free of the placemats I got to work weaving some samples for a trio of double-weave scarves I planned to make for a small group exhibition coming up in August. I used some 2 ply corriedale wool I had dyed previously that was in similar colours to what I planned for the final scarves, wove a small sample to check the sett was OK and then wove off the rest of the warp. I used double-weave so that I could weave phrases using Morse code into the scarves.

Once I had finished the samples I moved on to dyeing some more wool and warping up the loom for the final project. I cut the scarves off the loom on the last day of July, which was a relief as the exhibition they were for opened on the third of August. I’ll post some photos of the finished scarves in my next post.

Dyeing · Weaving

June

Frances1 Comment

Weaving

June has flown by and I’m not quite sure where all my time went. At the beginning of the month I took part in a Pop-Up Artists in Residence event at the Franklin Arts Centre which was good fun. I took a couple of looms, a rigid heddle for visitors to play on and my table loom, and some of my work. I worked on one of the doubleweave samplers from Jennifer Moore’s book in between chatting to visitors and another local artist Eric Braks popped in and drew a lovely sketch of me weaving (masked up of course). The colourful works on the gallery walls were painted by some local high school students who were also part of the event.

Handwoven scarves on a rack

I completed the doubleweave sampler and continued working on the Monk’s Belt placemats from this season of Jane Stafford’s School of Weaving. After a few months of setting up my new to me Mecchia dobby loom (it’s around 40 years old I think) I finally put the first warp on and started weaving. One of the wires leading to the dobby unit came loose soon after I started weaving and had to be reclamped but I have now managed a few hours weaving on the loom, with not too many issues (i.e. flying shuttles flying off the loom ). There’s a bit for me to learn, I’ve never used a dobby loom, flying shuttle or sectional beam before but I’m enjoying it so far.

Green, blue and white cotton tea towels being woven on a Mecchia dobby loom.
First steps on the Mecchia dobby loom
Doubleweave sampler

Dog Tales

We visited dog-friendly Rooseville Park in Pukekohe after being told about it by a friend and it lived up to the recommendation. The wet weather met that there were lots of great fungi to see as well as all the native trees. We only explored a small part of the park but we’ll be going back again to see more of it.

Dyeing · Weaving

The rest of May

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Weaving

I have finished weaving a couple more of the double weave accordion books, one with four sections and one with six. Handwoven using 2 ply corriedale yarn dyed with harakeke seedpods, the books are fun to play with and rearrange into new shapes.

Handwoven sculpture

Rufus

We have gone to the beach at low tide a few times with Rufus while we waited for him to be fully immunised for parvo. This week we are finally able to go walking in public with him which is great and will hopefully help burn off some of his energy.

Dyeing · Weaving

May 2022 so far

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Weaving

The tea towels in the last post have been washed but still need to be hemmed. There has been much moving of stuff and rearranging looms in my studio so not much actual weaving. I have finished the double weave projects on my table loom and have a few ideas on what to do differently next time.

On my jack loom I’ve started weaving the Monk’s Belt placemats from Season 6, episode 3 of the Jane Stafford School of Weaving.

Dyeing

We had a fun day trying indigo dyeing at the weaving group I belong to, here’s one of the silk pieces I dyed using resists.

Reading

The latest instalment in the Rivers of London / Peter Grant series.

Dyeing · Weaving

April Part 2

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Weaving

I have finished weaving the warp from Season 6 Episode 2 of Jane Stafford’s School of Weaving. I love the colours and patterns and once I get around the hemming them all I’m looking forward to using some of these tea towels in my kitchen.

Weaving continues on the double weave warp on my table loom. The warp and weft is corriedale dyed with harakeke (NZ flax) seed pods.

Reading

I purchased second hand copies of a couple of books about double weave that were offered for sale in a NZ weavers facebook group: Doubleweave on Four to Eight Shafts by Ursina Arn-Grischott and Double Weave by Palmy Weigle. They both look very interesting and am working my way through them. The latest issue of VÄV magazine arrived, I particularly liked the article “Twisted Colors”. I’m also reading Miss Pinkerton by Mary Roberts Rinehart as part of the Shedunnit book club.

Rufus

Still growing and exploring, he likes playing with the hose but doesn’t enjoy baths quite so much. He had his first puppy preschool class and now we’re working on the takoto/lie down command. He is pretty good at e noho/sit especially when food is involved.

Dyeing · Weaving

April – Part 1

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The big news this month is that we have a new member of our whānau. Rufus is a Spangold Retriever, also known as an English Springer Spaniel – Golden Retriever cross. He is 10 weeks old and full of beans when he’s awake.

Consequently weaving has taken a bit of a back seat since Rufus’ arrival. Prior to that I did some dyeing for a piece I wanted to weave to enter in a local arts show at Easter. The theme of the show was Light and Shade, and while I initially toyed with weaving something in shades of grey I decided that blues appealed to me more. These skeins are 2-ply corriedale wool dyed with varying concentrations of the same dye.

Using the techniques from the 3D double weave samples I wove in February I wound a warp, put it on my loom and started experimenting. You can see my first sample below, I needed to check how it would wash up as my previous samples were woven in cotton.

The finished piece, “The Blues” can be seen below or you can see it for the next 3 weeks at the Pollok Co-op.

I was delighted and surprised to receive an email on Thursday saying I had awarded Second-equal in the show and I’m looking forward to visiting the show this weekend.

Dyeing · Weaving

The rest of March

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This month I finished weaving a cotton warp that I started weaving in February. I dyed the warp after I had wound and chained it, which produced a tie-dye effect. The weft in the photo was a 20/2 cotton from DEA yarns. Now to decide what to make with it.

I have also been continuing to explore double weave, this time using some of my harakeke-dyed yarns. I wanted to try making an accordion book, inspired by these paper ones by Byopia Press and this woven one by Kaye Sekimachi. Even though I did make a little paper model and thought I had calculated the maths correctly I did get the proportions of this one how I wanted them to be but I’m pleased with it for a first try.

Uncategorized · Weaving

2022 Weaving Goals

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I’m a bit wary about setting weaving goals for 2022 as the last few years have taught me that plans can go pear-shaped at any time (thanks world-wide covid epidemic). However a plan and goals do help to motivate and focus me. Nothing like writing down all the things I want to do and realising that there aren’t enough hours to do them all even with my optimistic time estimates, and then there’s the excitement of ticking off an item on my list as complete. So I have written out a plan for the year and set my goals for the month ahead, and now we’ll see how it goes.

First up is further exploration of double weave and weaving more than 2 layers. I experimented a bit with double weave last year and this year I want to dive into this more. You can see some of my 2021 weaving experiments below.